Invaderbank The film creates a perfect balance between action and depth of basic needs, in the midst of an infertile atmosphere.

Bergorks If you like to be scared, if you like to laugh, and if you like to learn a thing or two at the movies, this absolutely cannot be missed.

Nicole I enjoyed watching this film and would recommend other to give it a try , (as I am) but this movie, although enjoyable to watch due to the better than average acting fails to add anything new to its storyline that is all too familiar to these types of movies.

Hattie I didn’t really have many expectations going into the movie (good or bad), but I actually really enjoyed it. I really liked the characters and the banter between them.

Hayden Shepherd This movie circulates around that delicate taboo subject of incest in a way that is oddly unusual. I watched it for a research project and found it a little wobbly in some parts but an overall decent movie.If you are particular about incest, than this movie is NOT the movie for you.There are 3 dominating incestuous scenes in this film. They are not only deeply sensual but also have strong elements of pedophilia, mostly because Joe is so very very young. He is 15... and he CERTAINLY looks it. This element may disturb some people, because not only is he young but he is obviously very attracted to his mother, whom goes about feeding that. I personally found it distracting at points, curious as to how they handled filming this with the amount of awkward tension and desire Andrew Barry was required to show for the part... and him, being under-aged and what not.No full-incest actually ever occurs, but as someone else reviewed, the strength and insinuation of desire is all there, and often the emotional sensuality between these two characters is far more incestuous than their actual behavior towards each other.The surrounding story line is weak at times. We never returned to Joe's drug addiction issues, it vanishes from the story-line, and the last part of the movie which, in my opinion, should have been dedicated to resolving the Oedipal relationship between the mother and son was rudely interrupted by the "real" father, whom, just ended up annoying me and providing very little to the story line.It was as if the director wanted to tell the story of the Mother and the Son but didn't commit, for fear of total rejection by the public and threw different elements in which added no flavor to the story.I didn't feel as if there was a resolution. But still, would rate this movie an 8 because I found it a good example of Oedipus Complex between a young teenager and his mother, and helpful to my research project.

abelardo64 A childhood memory, looking into his mother's face with a full moon creating a halo around her. Beautiful and so Italian. The mother in this case is Jill Claybourgh, she was raiding the crest of the wave then and it's very telling that she would choose to play a part that required, not just appearing completely nude but making love to her teen age junkie of a son. She is awkwardly terrific. Her face is a voyage in itself. I would have use quite a different wardrobe for her character as well as make up and hair style but maybe that was just a sign of its day. Jill laughs saying "I am crazy" and that would explain some of the dangerous nuttiness she indulges in here. Her son, played beautifully, by unknown - before and since - Matthew Barry. A Bertoluccian teen sex object if I ever so one. The film has oodles of moments to cherish. Tomas Milian plays the boy's real father. They've never met, His father still lives in a rather intense relationship with his mother, the stunning Alida Valli. In small, very small parts, Carlo Verdone, Roberto Benigni and Renato Salvatori. A film to enjoy with your heart, your gut and your libido but not your brain. Just live your brain for other Bertolucci jewels.

TimWil014-1 I actually auditioned for the role of the son when the mother was originally supposed to be played by Liv Ullman I think I read for it twice but was ultimately rejected because I looked too American in a Tom Sawyer kind of way-the boy who ended up doing it had a European quality in his face which Bertolucci wanted for the role. I saw it twice when it came out in the US, both times at the Loews Twin Cinemas. I remember it as having been gorgeously shot. The performances by Clayburgh and Barry are extremely good. Alida Valli is superb. The opera scenes were fantastic. Why isn't this out on DVD? Will we have to wait until after Bertolucci's death?

howie73 Not many discuss Bertolucci's La Luna as one of his most challenging films but I beg to differ. In 1979 I presume the film's campy allure had not been registered but today it's all to be seen; call it kitsch or ironic, but la Luna encapsulates two worlds Bertolucci tried to negotiate in most of his films - the world of appearances and surfaces against the inner world of the protagonist. La Luna plays both against each other as a masquerade, because what we think we are getting is not what we really are seeing. Bertolucci presents the first part as a post-Freudian fable in late 70s Rome where an Opera singer and her son indulge in an Oedipal relationship. Bertolucci then introduces the lost but real father to the scene as if to eradicate Freudian psychoanalysis as a spurious retelling of Greek myth. It seems the son only wants his father's recognition and love, while the mother is marginalized. It's a very masculine thesis for Bertolucci, one that reinforces the illusory fundamentals of Patriarchy, while negating the matriarchal as a mere bypass to the final journey(father's love).Jill Clayburgh's acting is off-key most of the time but this unwittingly invests the film with its latter-day camp quality, while Matthew Barry looks dazed and confused throughout the entire film. Rome is undoubtedly the best part of the film as well as the sumptuous visuals that capture its sun-drenched beauty and decaying but grand monuments.