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Those of you who saw Bertolucci's 1970's classic LAST TANGO IN PARIS with Marlon Brando will see a few similarities in this excellent film. Set in Paris in the late sixties, it revolves around three film students, a young innocent American – Matthew (Michael Pitt) and fraternal almost incestuous twins, Isabelle played by the gorgeous Eva Green – whose mother is a well known French actress in her own right – and her brother Theo (Louis Garret). My beautiful English date at the screening did not distinguish herself by asking why anyone would call themselves “evergreen!”

This was the start of the “Nouvelle Vague” period in French cinema. Jean-Luc Godard's BREATHLESS with Jean-Paul Belmondo and Jean Seberg was all the rage (He incidentally invented the “jump-cut” by accident. Wanting to trim his film but not leave anything out, he merely shortened every scene with brutal editing and everyone thought it was the most creative thing they had ever seen. Go figure.).

Matthew is picked up by Isabelle and Theo and taken to their luxurious apartment to meet their parents (Anna Chancellor and Florian Cadiou). The father is a famous, wealthy, somewhat reclusive poet, who takes off for long periods with his wife to their country house, leaving the twins large checks which they cash and live on during their parents absence.

I mentioned almost incestuous earlier, as they sleep and cuddle in the same bed together, are almost telepathic, and do everything except have actual sex. Matthew, the innocent with an angel face, is swept gradually into their life-style, until they ask him to move in with them. He is then pushed by the brother into having clumsy sex with his sister who it transpires – surprise, surprise – is a virgin!

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