That was a lot of naked people.

The Movie: Stealing Beauty, directed by Bernardo Bertolucci
Recommendation: H
Reason: "it is beautiful and there is some full-frontal rachel weisz"

There is indeed some full-frontal Rachel Weisz. There's also a lot of full frontal other people, but let's face it, we came for the Rachel, we stayed for the utterly gorgeous Italian landscape. No, really. The Italian landscape was beautiful, and the Matthew Spender sculptures that dotted the villa that served as the setting for the film were captivating. (Google him. You won't be disappointed) They kept me watching when the mildly confusing story and occasionally underwhelming acting distracted me.

For a coming of age tale, the movie was handled quite well. Bertolucci's visual sensibility (which I will continue to bring up at any opportunity, of course) is spectacular. I'm not normally a fan of the genre, but how can you possibly deny such a gorgeous film with such an honest vision at least the credit it's due. I've already mentioned that the acting was a little uneven-that failing can mostly be attributed to Liv Tyler, who was decent, but still very, very new and D.W. Moffett. The latter seemed to lose his character here and there, and I didn't really get a feeling of consistency from his performance.

I don't know how rewatchable the movie was-I suppose I could get through another viewing, just to catch a few more glimpses of the artwork and perhaps to get a better idea of Jeremy Irons' character. This does make me want to catch a few other Bertolucci movies, though. Last Tango in Paris, anyone?

-64/365 down, 301/365 to go