C

Even Janet Jackson and Justin Timberlake might blush at the graphic sexuality of Bernardo Bertolucci’s “The Dreamers,” a sort of adolescent version of his “Last Tango in Paris” in which three attractive youngsters–two guys and a girl–shack up in a flat in the French capital for days (and nights) on end. Two of them, it should be noted, are a local twin brother-and-sister pair who are engaged in an incestuous relationship (a favorite Bartolucci theme). The other is a naive American student whom they draw into their orbit. The result is explicit and steamy, with plenty of skin and private parts on display, all lovingly captured in the director’s characteristically considered compositions and cinematographer Fabio Cianchetti’s elegant photography.

That was true of “Last Tango,” too, but the earlier film had something this one lacks: depth. The Marlon Brando-Maria Schneider film was about much more than bare breasts and intercourse, and said a good deal about the nature of loss, pain and inchoate longing. This film, adapted by Gilbert Adair from his novel “The Holy Innocents,” certainly tries to add substance to the pretty surface. It wants to comment on connections among the revolutions that marked the mid-twentieth century: the student rebellion against war and socio-political oppression (expressed in the Parisian street demonstrations of 1968, against which the narrative is set); the cinematic revolution of the French New Wave (depicted through opposition to the government’s efforts to dismiss Henri Langlois from the Cinematheque Francais, where the lead trio–film buffs all–spend most of their time); and, of course, the sexual revolution. The intention is apparently to draw lines of reciprocal influence between them, which is an interesting notion. But the film fails to connect the dots in a fully coherent fashion. The numerous filmic allusions, in particular, come across as an affectation, a cute device that will certainly appeal to aficionados in the audience but otherwise doesn’t seem to have much point beyond the purely visual. Enticing Isabelle (Eva Green), her moodily handsome brother Theo (Louis Garrel) and Matthew (Michael Pitt), the repressed young Californian who falls in with them (even his absurdly tight jacket points to the fact that by European standards he needs loosening up)–meet as devotees of the Cinematheque, and we learn that the siblings tease one another by reenacting scenes from movies they’ve seen and daring the other to name the title or “forfeit,” meaning submit to some humiliation (ordinarily sexual) decided upon by the victor. The problem with all this is that it never gets more than skin-deep, if you’ll pardon the pun. The discussions of film that punctuate the trio’s conversations are, to be honest, as juvenile as the characters themselves. And the implication that the liberating power of cinema over social convention–symbolized in the trio’s recreation of the run-through-the-Louvre sequence from Godard’s “Bande a part”–in effect paved the way for sexual and political liberation is ridiculous; but it’s not presented tongue-in-cheek. In short, the effort to create a deeper context for the bedroom antics (though, to be fair, they’re performed in every room within reach) is intellectually fuzzy, sometimes to a laughable extent: when it comes to political matters, the views expressed by these kids are as puerile as the bric-a-brac (Mao-bust lamps, Marxist posters, magazine covers featuring Ho Chi-Minh) that litters the apartment.

Within this questionable broader perspective, the actors give their all in more ways than one, though none of them seems particularly comfortable. Pitt has never looked more like Leonardo DiCaprio as the callow American introduced to European pseudo-sophistication by the incestuous homebodies played (rather amateurishly) by Green and (with a slightly more convincing imitation of smoldering intensity) Garrel. The film is basically a three-character piece, but Robin Renucci and Anna Chancellor show some welcome subtlety as the twin’s supposedly sophisticated and extremely permissive parents (either they’re oblivious to what’s going on under their roof, or not terribly concerned about it).

“The Dreamers” has an attractive facade, but its apparent audacity turns out to be as empty-headed as its photogenic but vacuous lead characters. If Bartolucci expects to repeat the succes d’estime of “Last Tango in Paris” with this adolescent variant of it, he’s the one who’s dreaming.

Grade: B-

This second “Barbershop” earns a visit, if only by a hair. The sequel to the 2002 hit lacks the boisterous punch of its predecessor, being a more subdued and serious take on the formula, but it squeaks by on its ensemble energy, good-natured neighborly feel, and surprising degree of warmth. If the business isn’t quite so brisk this time around, there’s an amiable familiarity to the proceedings that warrants your continued patronage.

The plot concocted solo by Don D. Scott, who was one of the three writers on the original, centers on the threat to the family snip joint that Calvin (Ice Cube) owns on Chicago’s south side from a glitzy franchise operation called Nappy Cutz that an arrogant entrepreneur (Harry Lennix) is putting up directly across the street. The construction is just part of a wider gentrification project that threatens the character of the area as a whole. It’s a scheme that’s secretly being promoted by a slick but untrustworthy alderman (Robert Wisdom) in whose office uptight yuppie Jimmy (Sean Patrick Thomas), one of the barbers at Calvin’s in the first installment, now works.

The interrelationships at Calvin’s have changed a bit in other ways, too. Isaac (Troy Garity), the white guy who had trouble proving himself the last time around, is now a cutting superstar, often at odds with streetwise Ricky (Michael Ealy), who has a combustible love-and-hate connection with femme barber Terri (Eve). Leonard Earl Howze returns as Dinka, the optimistic immigrant who’s one of the shop’s permanent fixtures (with eyes for Eve), as does DeRay Davis as the local guy with lots of hot merchandise to sell. To replace the slapstick stuff that Garity provided to some extent before, but was especially attended to by the comic ATM-stealing duo of Anthony Anderson and Lahmard Tate (both absent here), we have Kenan Thompson, half of the old Nickelodeon Kenen and Kel team, as Calvin’s self-promoting but inept cousin, who’s just graduated from an obviously non-accredited barber school. All of these performers do nice work.

But the soul of “Barbershop 2” again belongs to Ice Cube, who once more brings a pleasant calmness and easygoing charm to Calvin, and Cedric the Entertainer, who steals scene after scene as the big-haired, oversized loudmouth Eddie. Unfortunately, Eddie has been defanged too much this time around. His hilarious rants in the initial picture, which were so politically sensitive that they raised the ire of some African-American leaders, are replaced here by much milder riffs on easier targets–mostly entertainment figures–and the result doesn’t have the same riotous effect. To provide him with a platform for a major outburst against a worthy opponent, Scott and director Kevin Rodney Sullivan–who stages the picture ably, though without the last ounce of effervescence–insert a barbecue scene in which Eddie faces off against the formidable Queen Latifah, as the owner of a nearby beauty parlor (there will soon be a spin-off movie in which she stars). But the insults the two trade don’t generate guffaws as big or prolonged as one would wish; it’s a funny sequence, but not the equal of Cedric’s uproarious Jesse Jackson-Martin Luther King diatribe in the first picture. And while it’s an intriguing idea to insert some important scenes from the character’s earlier days in flashback–especially ones showing how Eddie got attached to the shop then owned by Calvin’s father–most of those episodes prove much more serious than hilarious.

The upshot is that “Barbershop 2” is even more a heartwarming paean to the idea of neighborhood and tradition and less a farcical ensemble piece than the original film was. And if you go into it expecting the same mix you got the first time around, you might be mildly disappointed. But this installment in what will probably be a continuing franchise (not always a dirty word) is still reasonably enjoyable. It certainly looks good, with the establishing Chicago shots providing a fine background for the neighborhood setting and the interiors expertly fashioned; Tom Priestley’s cinematography is excellent, and even the score (mostly by Richard Gibbs) is supportive instead of intrusive. So while the laughs might not come as fast or last as long as one might like, and the uplifting Capraesque ending doesn’t quite come off–the expected turnaround seems abrupt and arbitrary–this is one clip shop that still deserves a return trip.