By now you've heard that director Bernardo Bertolucci whose film Last Tango in Paris caused much heat to prickle under the collars of 70s filmgoers, has once again gone up against the MPAA film ratings to bring us a sexually explicit romp. Because of the NC-17 rating, you may may have found it difficult to see The Dreamers at your local megaplex. If that's the case, well now it's out on DVD and you can watch the young nubiles and their debauched weekend in your own living room.

Fox is banking on the idea that there is an adult audience for solid plots with frank sex in them (though this plot is not all that solid). So how adult is it? Well, the sex is fun, whatever your preference. You get floppy penises, close-up vulva, plump breasts with bullseye-sized areola, not to mention that Matt, the American hero (actor Michael Pitt), has the most protruding nipples since Angelina Jolie in her Lara Croft Cradle of Life wet suit.

If you like Bertolucci's Last Tango, you should like The Dreamers, but you'll find it relatively tame. The so-called "sadism" isn't. Unless you consider the French tendency to pull the wings off philosophical butterflies. Sadists would sooner light up their dungeons by popping The Passion or The Secretary in the player. And anyone living on a rich diet of porn will find the sex like a low-carb menu.

If you thought there might be more of the same on the DVD -- or better sex, more full frontal nudity, nastier BDSM -- you were mistaken. This DVD is the same movie that went to theaters. And given all the hoopla it got for male nudity, I guess we should be glad they didn't actually cut this version so they could sell it at WalMart.

Unlike Bertolucci's Last Tango, there's no May/December love; all the naked bodies are young and attractive. Definitely a good starter film as you work your way to foreplay or a little dungeon scene. The three heroes are in the gap between protected childhood and entering "the real world" (that time of life when one has all the answers).

The plot? Well, come to think of it, you might just find it on the jacket of a porn video: A French brother and sister bring a young American film student and fellow cineaste home to their Parisian lair for a soft swinging ménage a trois. (Though set in Paris--where else -- the movie is mostly in English.) But the film also looks at the way we form our identities. Most adults can relate to the difficult (maybe life-long) task of trying to combine diverse bits of philosophy, sexuality, and aesthetic into a consistent personality they can live with. It is true that anyone who's been exposed to French art, criticism, or literature and found it rather like masturbation on mental Viagra will recognize the conversations in this film. But philosophical posturing doesn't spoil the fun. Bertolucci is a master at keeping the camera eye focused on the visually vivid, allowing those who want mental exercise to look around the pretty bodies to find it.

If you're a real cinema fan, you'll love the references to great moments in 20th century film, both in movie cut-ins and in the scenery. History/politics fans will enjoy references to the chaotic latter 60s, when protests hit major cities across the globe. On the other hand, if you like taut psychological drama that you can analyze into tomorrow, you'll find The Dreamers a little flat. It's more about capturing a frame of mind than following the path of growth.

If you just enjoy watching decadence, or you dream about the days when you did rebellious things simply for the thrill of it, you'll love The Dreamers. It draws its attitude from the sense of urgency that everything seems to have for the young at heart. The movie asks some interesting questions. For example, where do your ideals take you; what actions do they lead you to make?

In terms of visual appeal, the movie is stamped with Bertolucci's peculiar sensibility. His idea of sensual is always something raw that you have to pick out of the spoiled food, sort of like the characters end up doing. At one point, one of the characters voices what Bertolucci must think is the charm of his work (or if he's more self-flattering, the value of his work): "It disgusts you but you can't look away." Still, for most viewers in these days of Fear Factor and other gross-out reality shows, the word "disgust" won't come up often.

If the film was a test case for the NC-17 rating, it probably failed. Even now as it hits DVD markets, The Dreamers hasn't yet recuped the 15 million dollars it cost to make the film -- only grossing 2.5 million in the U.S. In it's biggest week, it only showed in 116 movie houses (compared to the thousands of theaters that the blockbusters get). You surely couldn't see it if you weren't near a major urban center. But not to worry too much about the film company. Most of the tickets ($11.3 million worth) to see this film were purchased abroad, foreign sales that helped Fox Searchlight close the gap on its production costs. Maybe DVD sales will fill in the rest.

Needless to say, it may be a long time before someone risks the NC-17 rating to make a mainstream film sexually explicit. The porn industry is probably sighing relief. But that can't be good news for kinky, sexy movie goers out in the hinterlands.