The Conformist

Jean-Louis Trintignant plays a man driven to a life of conformity in 1930s Rome--marriage to a bourgeoise (Stefania Sandrelli) and service to the Fascist Party--by a need to repress his own complicated sexuality and distance himself from his crazy family. In Bernardo Bertolucci's dizzyingly sensuous 1970 film, the temptations of decadence are great, especially when they come in the form of Dominique Sanda.

She plays the alluring wife of Trintignant's university mentor, an outspoken antifascist hiding in Paris whom Trintignant's bosses want to assassinate. It is one of the masterpieces of its era.

COPYRIGHT 2006 The Christian Century Foundation
COPYRIGHT 2008 Gale, Cengage Learning