Bunuel. To some it may feel like Bunuel should be closer to the top 10 but he’s got some really well reviewed films that don’t qualify for me (docs and experimental films) and several films that I just cannot find anywhere still. I’m always on the lookout, especially with all the ondemand and streaming options these days but as I said at the beginning I’m not going to just make assumptions about films I haven’t seen yet for my top 100 director list- which is why I plan to revisit it every 5 years or so. Bunuel had success making great films in Mexico, Spain, and an especially fertile artistic period in France from 1967-77. With great venom he attacked Christianity (particularly Catholicism), the rich and capitalism- wow did he ever! He was a pioneer in surrealism on the screen for sure. These are all rich attributes—but they are content attributes but not attributes unique necessarily to cinema.
Best film: Viridiana. This is Bunuel’s best film and it will blow your doors off. The last 15 minutes with the last supper and final scene are shattering. This is no longer the landslide I thought it was 5-10 years ago as the formal construction of The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie makes a strong case against the pictorial beauty of Viridiana.
total archiveable films: 13
top 100 films: 1
top 500 films: 6 (Viridiana, The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie, Los Olvidados, The Exterminating Angel, El, Belle De Jour)
top 100 films of the decade: 7 (L’Age d’Or, Viridiana, The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie, Los Olvidados, The Exterminating Angel, El, Belle De Jour)
most overrated: He’s got a few but I’ll go with Simon of the Desert at #902 on TSPDT. I’ve only seen it once and I don’t get it. It shouldn’t be in the top 1000 in my opinion. It’s 45 minutes because Bunuel got bored or stopped working on it. It’s not terrible but I’m sort of with him. haha.
most underrated: Bunuel doesn’t really have one. I guess I’d say The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie because TSPDT has it as his 6thbest film (though still in the top 200 all-time (at #160—I have it as #123) and I have it 2nd.
gem I want to spotlight: For the most part just work your way down my top 10. Los Olvidados is Bunuel’s take on Italian neo-realism. It’s wonderful because it is close to the work of Rossellini and De Sica but it certainly has Bunuel’s trademark acidity. I love it. It’s nearly impossible to find. The Exterminating Angel is easier to find and it’s the movie referenced in woody’s Midnight in Paris about the rich people who just, for some unknown reason, all decide they cannot leave the room. It’s fascinating cinema and worthy of all the praise.
stylistic innovations/traits: His greatest stylistic trademark is surrealism—which again isn’t really exclusive to cinema. Really his films are black comedies- anarchy- and flamethrowers aimed at his (as he viewed them) nemeses: the upper class, Christianity/religion but there are rarely heroes at all in his films. They most often are brutal depictions of a godless evil world. Viridiana is beautiful, Bourgeoisie an incredibly impressive formal work, and Los Olvidados an important film when telling the story of neo-realism.
top 10
- Viridiana
- The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie
- Los Olvidados
- The Exterminating Angel
- El
- Belle De Jour
- L’Age D’or
- Tristana
- Obscure Object of Desire
- Phantom of Liberty
By year and grades
| 1930- L’Age D’or | HR |
| 1950- Los Olvidados | MP |
| 1953- El | MS |
| 1960- La Joven (The Young One) | |
| 1961- Viridiana | MP |
| 1962- The Exterminating Angel | MS |
| 1964- Diary of a Chambermaid | R |
| 1965- Simon of the Desert | R |
| 1967- Belle De Jour | MS |
| 1970- Tristana | HR |
| 1972- The Discrete Charm of the Bourgeoisie | MP |
| 1974- Phantom of Liberty | |
| 1977- Obscure Object of Desire |
*MP is Masterpiece- top 1-3 quality of the year film
MS is Must-see- top 5-6 quality of the year film
HR is Highly Recommend- top 10 quality of the year film
R is Recommend- outside the top 10 of the year quality film but still in the archives
how do you feel about un chien andalou?
@m I haven’t seen it since 2004 or so- and only once. I don’t really watch shorts– a few exceptions here and there but not many. I’d try to watch it again the next time I dive into Bunuel. What are your thoughts?
Okay, I know you don’t look shorts,
but i’m sure you’ve seen this, because practically everyone talks about him, as i mentioned yesterday take a look at TSPDT and i was surprised to see the location of Un Chien Andalou at 138, these are the 16 best minutes in the history of cinema?
@Aldo– It has been ages since I’ve seen it. It has some strong imagery– but no- I don’t think these are the best 16 minutes in the history of cinema
So I noticed Bunuel’s The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie was available on Amazon Prime and I decided to watch it. I loved it and I’ll be on the lookout for more Bunuel in the future (Belle de Jour is on HBO Max). I think his sense of humor is hilarious and it’s put to great use in this film, which has to feature one of the greatest screenplays of all time. I feel that if this were an English-language film it would’ve had no problem winning the Original Screenplay Oscar (it won Foreign Language Film). I would’ve additionally nominated it for Best Picture, Best Director, Best Art Direction, Best Costume Design, and maybe even Best Supporting Actor for Fernando Rey. Its use of the telephoto lens (a la The Graduate) is quite commendable as well. It’s amazing how this film manages to be so repetitive in a lot of ways yet it never loses its freshness; at times he’ll do something stylistically and then he’ll literally do it again 5 seconds later but it’s just as potent, and every turn the story takes is brilliant and hilarious. And that conclusion, the gang still walking along the road, is just marvelous. Brilliant film and a MP.
Here are the findings from my Bunuel study!
Total Watched Films: 12
Total Archivable Films: 12
Top 100-Worthy Films: 2 (leaning 3)
Best Film: This is a really hard choice but I’m going to go with Viridiana by a hair over Belle de Jour. I saw Viridiana first so even though they’re damn near tied I have to pick it, but if Belle de Jour overtakes it in the top 100, don’t be surprised. Drake says “this one will blow your doors off,” and he’s not wrong. At around this point in Bunuel I was beginning to doubt whether he was a visual master of the scale of a Fellini, a Renoir, or even a Lang (Bunuel’s favorite director), and while some of the visual direction of this film can be a bit one-offy (I think of that tracking shot when Viridiana is going to sleep and she’s approached by Don Jaime), I think this film shows a new level of ambition that just wasn’t present in his previous work; there’s flashes of it in Los Olvidados and El, but the final scene where the hobos tear apart the villa puts Bunuel on a new level entirely from those films, and to have back-to-back masterpieces here (The Exterminating Angel the next year) solidifies Bunuel’s evolution here. Silvia Pinal does some really great work here, and so does Fernando Rey, but if I had to say who gives the best performance in the film (certainly so on a per-minute basis) I might just give the trophy to Francisco Rabal who is endlessly watchable in his scenes here; he takes over the film whenever he’s on screen and the final moment with the shot of the doorway does not belong to Pinal, but to him; it is his scene and his alone. He’s brilliant in his few scenes in Bunuel’s other giant masterpiece Belle de Jour (a bit disappointed actually that he had such little screen time) so there’s that as well.
Most Overrated: There’s a few to pick here. I thought The Exterminating Angel was overrated when I first watched it, but I gave it another chance at the end of the study and I now think #156 (TSPDT placement) is a pretty good spot. I didn’t archive L’Age d’Or the first time I watched that and I also watched it a second time and I was definitely wrong there; this film has grown on me exponentially since finishing the second viewing actually and I wouldn’t be surprised if I call it a masterpiece in a couple of days, but so far the #135 ranking on TSPDT (2 spots behind Los Olvidados) eludes me. I was bitterly disappointed by That Obscure Object of Desire (#601 on TSPDT) but I couldn’t find that except with a lackluster English dubbing that probably prevented the soul of the film from reaching out and grabbing me as hard as it could – and I doubt Bunuel would go ahead and make his last film so bad after such a great final act – so I’m leaving that unranked for now until I can find it in French. My pick here is going to be Un Chien Andalou at #141 of all-time. Unlike Drake, I have this in the archives and it’s an incredible film. The editing is really something to behold and so are a few of its images but come on, #141 of all-time is a joke, if I want to pick the best 15 minutes in all of cinema I’d currently pick the first 15 minutes of WKW’s masterpiece Chungking Express which is all the time it took for me to declare that a masterpiece (the first 15 minutes of CE are THAT good; I’ve never declared a film a masterpiece that quickly before or since), and if you want a shorter period of time I’ll choose the Battle of Shrewsbury in Welles’ masterpiece Chimes at Midnight which raises the film from a HR/MS to a MP in a couple minutes. I’ve only seen it the one time and I’ll watch it again but for now I’m saying this doesn’t make my top 500 any higher than like #475, and that’s assuming it even makes it in at all. Unlike L’Age d’Or, this one hasn’t grown on me very much since watching it.
Most Underrated: There’s a few here as well. Drake picks The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie, and indeed #165 on TSPDT is clearly a miss; it should be pretty close to the top 100. The Phantom of Liberty is also incredibly underrated at #585; very close to a masterpiece, that film is. That being said, Belle de Jour is even more underrated at #201; this is a top 100 film of all time and it should be right up there with Viridiana at #66. I’m going to pick neither of those two however. It’s a difficult choice, but it comes down to Tristana at #400 and Simon of the Desert at #912. Because I love to troll Drake so much about his hatred of Dogville and this is basically the same situation, I’m going to pick Simon of the Desert here. This film is incredible and I don’t know how I’ll keep it out of my top 500. Drake complains about how Bunuel never finished this film and left it at 45 minutes just because he felt like it, which is not actually true; Bunuel DID finish it, but it was only part of a portmanteau film, with others to be directed by Federico Fellini and Jules Dassin, segments which did not come to fruition as they wanted to direct their wives Giulietta Masina and Melina Mercouri in the role played by Silvia Pinal in this film, terms Bunuel and producer Gustavo Alatriste (Pinal’s husband) refused. There’s some great religious commentary in this film centering on how Simon has built a pillar and lives on top of it forever in order to be close to God in the sky, but alas, as close as he can get to God physically, he will never reach him, yet in doing so ignores all of the people around him, including his mother; Bunuel’s idea here is that organized religion as Simon practices is merely a diversion from the world around you and a road to nowhere (now where have we seen a never-ending road in a Bunuel film?). There’s actually a whole lot more than that to say, especially concerning Silvia Pinal’s Satan character, but to avoid spending too much time on this one film I’ll cut it off here, but Drake says on the 1965 page that its ideas are merely truncated and half-baked, and he’ll realize he’s wrong the next time he watches it.
Gem I Want to Spotlight: I spurned Tristana in favor of Simon of the Desert above so it’s only fair that I pick the former here. #400 on TSPDT, HR from Drake, disappointingly lukewarm reception on Letterboxd (TONS of 3-star reviews; I have it at 5 which is MP level). I like to bully (in good fun of course) Declan sometimes when I think he misses badly on a film and he watched this like 4 days before I did and gave it a HR which really made me laugh during the film as how he thought this was so weak. You’ll notice a pattern reading lots of the lackluster Letterboxd reviews: “the film is not as good as Viridiana,” “will always exist in the shadow of Viridiana,” “just a shabby remake of Viridiana,” goddamnit SHUT UP. What happened to this film is pretty much the same thing that happened to Casino from Scorsese in the 90s; that film was just “Goodfellas 2.0,” and this is “Viridiana 2.0.” Admittedly, I can’t deny that in many ways it is very similar to Viridiana; the film’s namesake is the title character, a young woman who has recently lost her parents and, to her chagrin, has caught the affections of her guardian, her much-older uncle played by Fernando Rey, and the consequences of that relationship for her. This film is notably one of Bunuel’s darker films; the material is much grimmer than anything else Bunuel made that I have seen. Deneuve is absolutely brilliant here as the title character, I’d say she’s slightly stronger here than she is in Belle de Jour with a more physical performance here (her character loses her leg). Watching her walk around with her crutches or especially with her cane as she leaves her wedding to Rey… extremely powerful physical acting to behold. Rey of course is great here again, playing in many ways the same Don Jaime from Viridiana, but with more screen time he’s given more time to flesh out his performance; seeing him after Viridiana leaves him with Franco Nero as he begins to drink himself to death is physical acting perhaps not on Deneuve’s level (he’s not playing a character without a limb) but it’s really strong and worthy of a lot of respect. I don’t think he quite reaches the level he’s at in The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie (he’s so funny there) but he’s excellent.
Rankings:
1. Viridiana
2. Belle de Jour
3. The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie
4. Los Olvidados
5. The Exterminating Angel
6. Tristana
7.The Phantom of Liberty
8. El
9. L’Age d’Or
10. Simon of the Desert
11. Un Chien Andalou
12. That Obscure Object of Desire
Ratings:
1929: Un Chien Andalou – HR/MS
1930: L’Age d’Or – MS
1950: Los Olvidados – MP
1953: El – MS
1961: Viridiana – MP
1962: The Exterminating Angel – MP
1965: Simon of the Desert – MS
1967: Belle de Jour – MP
1970: Tristana – MP
1972: The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie – MP
1974: The Phantom of Liberty – MS (leaning MP)
1977: That Obscure Object of Desire – UR (Unrated)
You say that Drake hates Dogville with an R, and that I thought Tristana was weak with an HR – you make good notes about these but you do often make out like other people don’t appreciate certain films just because they give them lower ratings than you. I wrote a very glowing review on Tristana that illustrated why I thought it was such a great film, so I am confused and disappointed that you only focused on the grade I assigned it. I’m just far more interested in discussing a film’s artistic qualities than picking discrepancies over where it sits on a scale – which I get is a significant feature of this site, but I still feel Drake has similarly always recognised that it is only secondary to the film appreciation itself.
Declan is correct, and there is another factor involved as well. You seem to have a laxer standard for films to enter into the higher grades of the Cinema Archives grading system. In all your studies, you seem to have many more MPs and MSs than Drake does. It’s completely fine if your utilization of his system is different than other people, but you can’t criticize (you literally use the descriptor “bully,” though I’m aware it was a joke) others for interpreting the grading slightly differently. It is possible that some of the discrepancies between you and others are due to differently interpreting the system, rather than having a different view of the movie’s quality.
I hope I don’t sound rude. No hard feelings; it was just a little note I wanted to mention.
I must add the disclaimer that I have not actually seen Dogville or Tristana (certainly I will), so for all I know you may be completely correct with your MPs in those situations by any interpretation of the system. My note may not even be valid in these two cases.
@Graham – good point
@Declan and @Zane. I have always taken the “hates Dogville” thing as at least a partial joke. Zane makes the “troll” comment himself. I really like the Casino/Goodfellas vs. Tristana/Viridiana comment (not that I agree here necessarily- but I like the comparison).
I Noticed Nazarin wasnt in here or the 1959 archives, i was wondering if you have seen It and your thoughts on it. I know tarkovsky loved it
@Big chungus- I haven’t seen it- haven’t been able to lay my hands on it
It is availible for free on youtube (atleast where i live) and its pretty good quality too
I’m forced to cut these up since the entire thing is just too long.
Un Chien Andalou:
Third viewing; my second was a massive revelation but I did not write notes for it which was a mistake in retrospect
The music perfectly encapsulates the haphazard nature of whatever happens in the film; really incredible choice
One of the fastest-paced films of all time; up there with any French New Wave film in that regard
The close-up of the ants coming out of his hand is incredible
Many great dissolves between the surreal images here, especially during the groping scene with the brilliant editing
He drags the two pianos with the dead horses on them; very well-edited as you try to figure out what is happening
Slow-motion camera at 11 minutes; wow
The scene where the books turn into guns, with which the one guy kills the other, who then keels over and reappears in an open field where he finds the woman is absolutely brilliant; gobsmackingly so
She goes back to her apartment and then walks out to find a beach, where she and another man find a small box that was thrown out by one of the other characters earlier in the film, before the final shot of the two dead on the beach ends the film
I feel like there’s a growing case for the early days of cinema as being the strongest and this and L’Age d’Or contribute to that; a period in which men were interested in exploring this new art form and figuring out new ways of expression through it before it’s more commercial potential was realized
A Must-See film after 3 viewings; a 4th may move this up to a Masterpiece
The Criminal Life of Archibaldo de la Cruz:
Starts out with a pretty decent montage of shots as Archibaldo describes his early childhood, mise-en-scene involving a toy train set
His maid tells him a story about a King who killed his Queen by a wish from a toy box, which then repeats with young Archibaldo and his maid
Archibaldo is speaking to his nurse in the hospital, who he then attempts to kill; he fails but she runs out of a window and dies anyway
Two men discussing Archibaldo’s case mention a “wife’s tragedy”
Stunner of Archibaldo in the background and his servant in the foreground with several layers of doorways separating them at 16 minutes
Archibaldo’s face in 2 mirrors (3 faces total) at 18 minutes before a dissolve back to his memory of his dead maid as blood pours over the screen; actually kind of avant-garde; I remember Roeg doing this in Don’t Look Now
Shot of at least 20 people arranged around a gambling table at 26 minutes
Much closer variant of this shot a minute later using varied depth of field with the chips at varying places on the table for mise-en-scene
A canted mirror shot of 2 people talking that Archibaldo is listening in on at 28 minutes
Archibaldo is inside the house of a woman he probably plans to kill; she has a wall of pictures of male celebrities, one of whom appears to be John Wayne
Formal elements with a dissolve with a large deal of smoke and his theme playing as he imagines himself killing the woman, and we saw the same thing happen earlier with his maid
Like with the nurse, the woman dies but Archibaldo does not kill her; a bit like Discreet Charm
Woman’s face superimposed behind a burning flame at 45 minutes, this woman then claims she is Archibaldo’s cousin to get away from her boring friends (they are in a bar together) despite having only previously met once when Archibaldo reclaimed his music box (from the maid’s death) at a pawn shop
Excellent dissolve of a clothing shop mannequin that looks exactly like the woman from the above note dissolving into the actual live character at 53 minutes; she is being used as a model at the mannequin shop which Archibaldo is searching for
Archibaldo opens up a drawer with a large quantity of women’s clothing in it that he caressed gently; a crossdresser?
This is explained immediately afterwards with a great (and a bit creepy) formal joke here; Archibaldo invites the woman from the bar to his house to meet his “cousin” who is actually the mannequin which he either bought or ordered a second one for himself, referencing that she said he was her cousin to meet him at the bar
Archibaldo mentions “seeing her engulfed in flames,” “appearing as a witch at the stake,” “his little Joan of Arc”
It’s funny; whereas Él was like Vertigo, this film is (to a lesser extent) like Psycho
She escapes his grasp before he can kill her so he just resolves to commit a mock murder of her mannequin instead
Again, the smoke over the screen and his theme playing as Archibaldo envisions the murder of his wife-to-be, who is cheating on him
That is turned upon its head as her affair partner kills her at the wedding in the exact same manner Archibaldo had planned to do it, the controversy mentioned at the beginning of the film
Even more form as we realize the entire film is Archibaldo narrating the events of his life to the two men discussing the nurse’s death at the beginning as a confession of his “guilt” in the murders, which cannot be proven as he did not actually kill them
The ending is a flaw; it’s… so happy and pleasant, which doesn’t seem very “Bunuel” to me and Archibaldo actually having a happy ending doesn’t really mesh very well with the rest of the film having him try to kill people for no apparent reason and the like, I don’t see Bunuel doing something like this of his own vision, maybe it was pushed on him by the producers?
Highly Recommend after one viewing; a fun comedy thriller
Nazarin:
Francisco Rabal is, as always, perfectly watchable here as the priest Nazario; almost like a Spanish Bogart in his acting method
Tarkovsky voted for this in the 1972 Sight & Sound poll which is very interesting
Great dissolve between two walls at 24 minutes
Interesting element where many of the women have painted faces
Foreground/background work as Nazario interacts with and joins a bunch of men digging and moving wheelbarrows
This version of Bunuel’s film is not the best resolution, I should mention, which is a definite minus
Nazario is currently on a pilgrimage to learn about suffering and the hard life
Really not a massive amount to speak of here stylistically
Nice composition from a low angle at 50 minutes
Lots of conversation and depiction of an ascetic Christian lifestyle; I can see why Tarkovsky loved this so much but it surprises me that Tarkovsky, a brilliant stylist, loved so many films that are stylistically weak-to-average (I just finished a Bresson study so there you go…) largely because of their religious content. Often a lot of the conversation can be very interesting and intellectual to listen to but often at times like this I often wonder why I’m not watching a fun Howard Hawks movie or something instead
Lighting using a campfire at 53 minutes
Stunning composition of Nazario and his fellow pilgrims standing over a dying man at 54 minutes
Another one at 57 minutes
Lots of low angles at this point in the film
Some boys playing with a dwarf to use him as a piñata; reminds me of Los Olvidados
Bunuel rejoined the Church 9 years after making this film and this is a clear stepping stone towards his coming to understand the humanism behind faith
Again I’ll mention this is one of Tarkovsky’s top 10 films of all time
There’s a very direct correlation between my lack of much to say about this film and the grade I am about to give it
Recommend; not in or close to the top 10 of 1959, much less of all time; I just don’t love the film as much as I do the Francisco Rabal performance
Simon of the Desert:
Love the opening scene with the pilgrims walking over to Simon’s pillar whilst vocalizing; this leads into a crane shot of Simon on the pillar
Love the long shot of Simon climbing the second pillar with a number of pilgrims watching him at 5 minutes
More imagery; a high angle of Simon on the pillar looking over the crowd; really beautiful
Silvia Pinal entering at 9 minutes
Stunning edit from a medium shot of Brook to a closeup at this time
Tracking shot up the pillar at 12 minutes
A few dissolves coming in at 15 minutes
Great uses of the pillar shot from far away
A God’s eye shot at 17 minutes; I guess not surprising considering the material
Love the editing as Silvia Pinal (Satan) virtually teleports from below the pillar to on it with Simon
I think with a longer film (though I’ll note it is as short as it is intentionally) and more time to develop the film’s concepts and narrative it is stronger; it comes off somewhat as a series of unconnected incidents
A great camera movement into a pseudo-split diopter shot at 24 minute
So many great high and low angles using the pillar and the surrounding area as a set piece
Stunner of Simon on the pillar as sand is blowing past him at 27 minutes
Silvia Pinal shows up again, this time dressed up as Jesus; Bunuel does something similar in his wonderful L’Age d’Or
Love the one of Pinal looking up at Simon on the pillar from a low angle at 30 minutes
Stunning scene with the coffin moving on the ground to the pillar, eventually opening to show Pinal inside once again
There’s probably some comparison to be made here with A Christmas Carol; the first Pinal, the young girl, as the Ghost of Christmas Past; the second, Jesus, as the Ghost of Christmas Present; and the final, the girl in the coffin, as the Ghost of Christmas Future; the final one especially as she literally takes him to the future with the plane
When we finally see the plane coming it really is a stunning moment
Wow; the montage in NYC with the fisheye lens; there’s a shot in Hiroshima mon Amour that looks like this of Riva walking by a building, and a similar one in the intro of Spike Lee’s masterpiece 25th Hour
Tracking shot through the club before we eventually come to Pinal, having fun, and Brook, unenthused with the change in scenery
The nightclub scene is undoubtedly one of the best in Bunuel’s filmography
Might not even be one of Bunuel’s best 10 films; for Bunuel to have a film that is this good land outside of his top 10 places him in a group that not many directors can say they’re a part of
I’m watching this actually a few weeks after I watched these other Bunuel films as I acquired a subscription to the Criterion Channel which this is on, a few others on there are Diary of a Chambermaid, Robinson Crusoe, and That Obscure Object of Desire which I think I will watch as well; there’s some Bergman and Renoir here as well that I need to catch up on too
A Must-See film
Tristana:
Camera pans through a bunch of boys playing soccer; lots of handheld shots in this scene
The kids are still playing in the background as the adults talk; Bunuel shows kids playing soccer a lot, Los Olvidados starts out with a soccer game I think
Depth work in this scene where Deneuve, Rey, and the maid move Deneuve’s stuff out of her house; there are often 2 or even 3 layers of depth in the way the characters are shot in this scene
Cluttered mise-en-scene at various depths from a high angle in a shot at 8 minutes
Literally right after Rey says “you’re not a servant in this house,” he makes her put his shoes on for him
Deneuve is speaking with one of the maid’s friends in the close foreground as the deaf kids play with a bird in a cage in the background whilst out of focus; really great foreground/background work here
Incredible mise-en-scene here in a shot of the three inside a bell tower at 13 minutes
We discover it is actually Deneuve having a nightmare as she sees Rey’s head swinging from one of the bells
Wall art-quality shot of Rey in the middle of a hallway at 14 minutes
Brilliant tracking shot through a filled and very lively restaurant at 15 minutes; wow; settled into a high angle shot of Rey with his friends
Nice camera tracking between the men in this scene as Rey converses with his friends
Bunuel plays a lot of attention to the background in this scene with his friends to make the restaurant appear alive
Bunuel loves warm colors; uses many reds and oranges in the mise-en-scene
“If you want an honest woman, break her leg and keep her home.” Foreshadowing
Short POV camera of Deneuve looking at the curved roof above her; a bit like the opening of Last Year at Marienbad actually up
Wow; a true stunner of Deneuve and an engraved face in close-up at 25 minutes
Camera moves next to a wall showing them walking into the room (on the other side) before the door is closed as Rey walks over to Deneuve to make love; Greenaway does this in The Cook, the Thief and so does PT Anderson in Punch-Drunk Love to my memory; there are other examples of course
Rey is very hypocritical; speaks often about the merits of socialism and the need for a revolution in Spain but is the exact kind of aristocratic individual he seems to have contempt for
Extreme close-up of Deneuve’s hand and some food at 33 minutes
Striking camera movement between 2 streets at 35 minutes
Framing Deneuve right before she finds Franco Nero at 36 minutes
Incredible 2-shot of Nero in close-up in the foreground and Deneuve at a medium distance in the background
Zooms between the faces of Rey and Deneuve as they walk in a park and see Rey’s sister (who later dies)
Sound design brilliance in this scene set in a blacksmith’s workplace; sounds of machinery at work galore; actually felt like Dancer in the Dark when Deneuve walked in
The costume design in this movie is absolutely a highlight; compare Deneuve’s conservative, old-fashioned plaid dress to Nero literally just wearing a blue sweater; such a modern look, especially in the late 1920s when this film is set
Great mise-en-scene in Nero’s place; all of his art equipment placed around his house
There is form in the way the film cuts; oftentimes scenes end abruptly with characters waking up with what appears to be a nightmare; first it was Deneuve in the bell tower, then it was Rey when Deneuve was with Nero in his studio, later on in the film it will be Deneuve again when she has the vision of Rey’s severed head again
Several fantastic frames in sequence coming in at an hour in; there’s one of Rey against some stairs that could come from The Conformist
I can’t say enough how much I love Fernando Rey
Franco Nero looks like a completely different person in the second act
Wonderful montage of Deneuve playing piano; emphasis placed on her newfound lack of a leg as Nero stands behind her ignored completely
Intensity in the angles at which they are shot as Deneuve and Nero fight and decide to end their relationship
A standout movement of the camera between Rey and Nero standing at different depths from the camera; Renoir uses this one in Toni
Deneuve’s shaking as she walks around with her cane is great physical acting, not to mention Deneuve’s makeup; she appears as if Rey has turned her into his doll, used only for his pleasure. Her fake leg even makes her appear almost as an action figure as well
Montage of some religious statues before we see the marriage of Rey and Deneuve; it should be noted that Deneuve wears black, not white, to her marriage
Editing and sound design combination as Rey converses with his friends in his room whilst Deneuve walks on her one leg with crutches in the next hallway, occasionally appearing in the door sill multiple times
It is snowing outside; we get a short montage of the snow either outside or shown from the windows; at the end of this the camera pulls back to show Rey and his friends are no longer at the table, combined with the low lighting it is really striking to watch
Deneuve has her nightmare where she sees Rey’s severed head attached to the bell tower; this connects formally to two narrative strands in the film, one is that this is her second experience with this vision, and another is Rey’s own experience waking up from a nightmare; his of seeing Deneuve and Nero in a relationship together; earlier in the film
The ending; Deneuve kills Rey with the fake hospital call in the next room over before opening the windows to allow the cold in, before the montage of many of the previous events of the film plays, and the film ends. A strong ending
On my first viewing I thought this film was a bit front-loaded, but I don’t think that’s true anymore; a lot of the brilliance comes from the formal comeback of many previous elements featured in the film later on.
The production values are much lower compared to say Belle de Jour or The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie; I wonder if that’s because those films were shot in France whereas this was shot in Spain; this hurts the film somewhat as it can’t compete with their beauty
Leaning Masterpiece
@Zane- Wow…just wow. It is going to take me some time to check this out but thank you for sharing and congrats on the excellent work!
I’ll be diving deep into surrealism in few weeks & I’ll be watching works of David Lynch and Buñuel. I’ve never seen virdiana and i wanna know if there’s surrealism in it? Anyone who has watched it can help me here.
*Viridiana
Viridiana does contain surrealism, though as far as I’m aware it may have less than most other Bunuel movies (though it is the only work of his I’ve seen). There is a surreal scene in which the titular character sleepwalks, and I think it may be lightly implied that some of the sequences with the boisterous beggars push a little beyond reality. There is lots of symbolism as well, which is a trait of surrealism. However, the movie does not really include any dream or fantasy sequences like other surrealist masterpieces.
@Graham- thanks for the help here. I’ve only seen his french work. Excited to explore his Spanish work as well.