Bertolucci goes back to his homeland

It’s back to Italy for the maker of The Conformist (1970) and 1900 (1976). Me and You has given Bernardo Bertolucci a new opportunity to study a subject that is dear to him: our quest for identity.

Bernardo Bertolucci knows how to uncover talent better than anyone else. Everyone remembers Liv Tyler’s electrifying performance in Stealing Beauty (1996), one of the Italian director’s most recent films. The actress was then unknown, and played an American teenager who falls in love with an intellectual in a house in Tuscany. In Me and You, Bernardo Bertolucci has once again entrusted young actors with the keys to his film. The main characters are brother and sister, behind closed doors in a basement, a situation which tests their relationship.

The film is an adaptation of Niccolo Ammaniti’s story about adolescence, and ends nine years of absence from the screen for Bernardo Bertolucci. The director chose to shoot in his homeland and in his mother tongue, after having spent a long time away from them. “I wanted to hear Italian in one of my films, have Italian actors and shoot in Italy“, declares the director.

As is the case of Stealing Beauty, Bernardo Bertolucci’s works (The Dreamers, Little Buddha) question our quest for identity. Me and You is a film about teenage deception, aspirations, battles and dreams. “I found it very seducing to film young people and to try and capture their vitality and curiosity“, explains Bernardo Bertolucci. It was thought at one point that the film would be shot in 3D, but it was not to be the case.

The film will be screened at 4p.m. in the Grand Théâtre Lumière.