This review is not about THE movie, but about Marlon Brando performance.

The unusual story (back to that time) of a grown-man having an affair with a girl that is 20 years younger that him, made a big controversy, for some erotic parts, in 1973.

The acting and directing are the only thing that this movie to be praised. The script, though original, in that time, is kinda silly, and the movie is waaaay long! I almost felt asleep.

Just ONE thing made me like this movie, and it was Marlon Brando's performance. His third best performance EVER (the first one for A Streetcar Named Desire, the second one for On the Waterfront). I liked all performances but not equal, though I was focused just on Marlon Brando, and when he was not on screen I was focused on Bertolucci's directing; sometimes in the girl too.

Marlon Brando was simply amazing! I felt it, I felt his pain when he was "talking" to her dead wife, his past, I felt the character, he didn't even think he was acting, it looked like it was his own life. What I liked the most about him was that he wasn't using one of those accents he used in movies like The Godfather, but I liked him in The Godfather.

Maria Schneider (Jeanne) should have get an Academy Award nomination for Best Actress, she was great, not like Marlon Brando, but she was really great. The rape scene, I don't know how she accepted to do it, cause it was not on the screenplay, Marlon Brando suggested that scene. She was touching as Marlon Brando, but apparently she was not recognized and the movie and her acting and Marlon Brando's performance were overshadowed by the controversy.

The movie itself is boring and long but is not bad, there are some sex parts that people call it "soft porn", but they are almost nothing, though I didn't liked the rape part, it was creepy: "Go get the butter".

The 90% is for Brando, Bertolucci and Maria Schneider, not the whole movie itself, if the movie wouldn't have them it would be like a 20% for me.

Brando is genius in the movie, with or without the butter.