That Obscure Object of Desire (1977) - Luis Buñuel

With this movie comes the outcome, the corollary to which is most likely the most important spanish film career, ends with this film the oeuvre of the genius of Aragon, Luis Buñuel puts an end to his cinematic journey with this remarkable feature. All the way traveled by the filmmaker, all his evolution reaches here the culmination, Buñuel would not direct a film again, many of his lifelong topics, his obsessions were naturally contained here, keeps the constants of the final stage of his artistic career, that is, being a scriptwriter, to work with his co-writer, Jean-Claude Carrière, both inspired in a literary work by Pierre Louÿs, which narrates the bizarre adventures of a middle-aged man who falls desperately  in love to his young and attractive maid, to the point of obsessing with her, but, by never consummating this overflowing passion, the individual loses his dignity, being prey to the whims and humiliations of which the girl makes him an object. Memorable film, which meant the farewell of one of the greatest surrealist filmmakers, the initiator of that current actually, a referential european director, who remains coherent and faithful until the last moment with his main artistic edges, the greatest spanish filmmaker directed for the last time.

                   

We see Mathieu (Fernando Rey), buy a train ticket from Spain to Paris, board his transport, but before leaving, he throws a bucket with water to a girl (Carole Bouquet). It awakens the curiosity of his traveling companions, among them another woman (Milena Vukotic), and a dwarf professor of psychology (Piéral), to whom he explains why he did that. Remember that he traveled to visit his cousin Edouard (Julien Bertheau), where he meets the servant Conchita, the initial female. He tries to woo her (now it's Ángela Molina), but she leaves the next day. Some time later, he finds her again, arrives at her house, where lives precariously with her mother, Encarnación (María Asquerino), and soon gives them money to help them. He often repeats his visits, sees her practicing andalusian dances, and suddenly, Conchita leaves again. Mathieu lives with his butler, Martin (André Weber), finds her again, they live together, but she, claiming to be a virgin, does not agree to the sexual act, despairs Mathieu, and when he discovers that she got another man into his house, throw both out. Martin listens to his laments, again he finds her, outside Paris already, he goes to see her work, she dances naked for some tourists. Mathieu suffers more humiliations, hits her, memories are over, she, also on the train, now throws a bucket of water on him. In the end, they both go together.

This is how the last film of the spanish director ends, a genuine reference to iberian art cinema, unlike so many other contemporary directors, countrymen  of his, certainly at a large distance from someone who has been influence for them, and many other filmmakers, a director whose absence does not seem to have found a worthy successor yet. In this, his corollary film, the master of surrealism seems to have finally satiated his dreamlike appetite, now he leaves aside the world of dreaming, delirious fantasy, absurdities and contradictions appreciated in the two previous exercises, The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie (1972) and The Phantom of Liberty (1974), replaced now with a conventional, linear narrative, and this linearity will not be broken, a somewhat more formal presentation, but which would seem to imply the final form of a mature, aged master, who does not take pleasure in telling one delirium after another anymore. Now we observe, again, and in a repeated manner, one of the figures he exhibited at the end of his career, that is, terrorism, terrorist attacks that we had already seen in the two previous films mentioned above, apparently a late obsession in his career, to the point that this final explosion is a leitmotiv of the explosion of the attack that we appreciate at the beginning of the film; that image, that fire, is what closes a whole filmography. Similarly, as in Belle de jour (1967), we see the detail of the feet, another element always buñuelian, the feet of Mathieu going up a stair, in a very obvious insinuation, almost an echo of what was seen in Catherine Deneuve and the snatched film about the double life of an aristocrat unsatisfied of her marital life. Again the subject of jealousy appears, although not in the central plane, as it was in Tristana (1970), now one of the themes is jealousy and impotence before a woman who simply has fun and relax playing with a man who knows obsessed with her body. We also have the detail of the box, observed from the filmic beginning of the filmmaker, with the delirious Un Chien Andalou (1929), and that we would see repeatedly in his films, as in, just to give an example, again Belle de jour; in his cinematic peroration, the filmmaker collects some of his obsessions, and finally that little box, one of the most mysterious buñuelian elements, is open, revealing some trinkets of no importance. The director said at some point that he himself did not know what was inside, and in his final picture, the mystery is over.

The last image of a Buñuel film.

One of the most fascinating details of the film, and mysterious at the same time, undoubtedly is the use of the two actresses to interpret Conchita, and it is remarkable that since the first sequences appear both women, being the first to flow the french Bouquet, being soaked when following the train where Mathieu goes. But it does not take long to appear the spanish Molina, invested as a servant, in the past, it is certainly indistinct the use of one and another actress, it is uncertain the accurate use, the reasons for one or another interpreter. There remains in the mystery the real origin and mechanics of the resource of Buñuel of the two females to interpret Conchita, it does not seem to be something easy to explain, as if a woman embodies the most sexually charged parts, and the other the most moderate or cold parts; nor is it the case that one interprets a part of the film, and the other actress is in charge of a second part, where the character undergoes a substantial change -those circumstances would have been probably more suitable for Tristana, even the director refers in an interview that, years later, he would have liked to apply this interpretive principle in that film-, and the change of woman highlights that variation. With singular and abrupt arbitrariness the director changes from one actress to another, both women appear indistinctly, their incursions on the screen merge as indivisible braid, making it really complex to notice the intentions of the filmmaker in that regard; even relying on testimonies from those involved in the filming, co-scriptwriter, production assistant, other actors, the source, nature and mechanics of the resource's operation are not fully clarified. Buñuel said that it was simply an incidental detail, something unplanned and spontaneous, an explanation that, in one way or another, does not quite convince. What we do know for sure is that the actress originally selected to play Conchita was Maria Schneider, this as a result of the international success of Bertolucci's The Last Tango in Paris (1972), an election that ended up being unsuccessful, and Buñuel states that he proposed, almost without wanting, to Serge Silberman the possibility of using two actresses, a suggestion that convinced the producer; once again, this is the aragonese version. Anyway, on the one hand we have Molina, fiery, fervid, hispanic, in front of the cold and more hieratic Bouquet, one blonde, red, the other brunette; one more sophisticated and distant, the other more visceral and popular, as it is Molina, naturally, a tribute from the director to his land at the end of his career, dancing, speaking spanish, the hispanic vein, Andalusia, runs through her and her fiery nature. Curiously, even the journey that Mathieu undertakes is from Spain to France, the two nations from which the actresses who incarnate the object of desire come from.














We find the filmic narrative structured in flashback, a narrative resource quite unusual in the filmmaker, not seen in his filmography the way in which the main core is approached as a glance backwards by the protagonist, constituting this a substantial difference with his two previous exercises already mentioned, diametrically opposed in their narrative structuring. We can also mention how unusually colorful his palette is, its chromatic amplitude, especially in exteriors, short but beautiful sequences where that range of colors, its framings, and the composition of its frames, as well as the movement of the camera at those moments, they turn those succinct sequences in some of the most appreciable aesthetic samples of the director. In that sense, the camera is shown more accurate than in other opportunities, with greater determination following the actions of the characters, but also making approximations, zooms to get closer to the protagonists' close-ups, intensifying the representations, it is certainly a more expressive camera, which introduces us more effectively into the characters. The title is perfect for the feature film, the female is certainly a dark object of desire, unattainable obsessive object, indecipherable, distant, ungraspable for her admirer. According to the aforementioned, it is enough to see the cinematographic work of Buñuel to realize that one of the main constants in his cinema is frustration, frustration in different varieties, the amour fou not consummated in The Golden Age (1930), the dinner of the aristocrats that is never given, first in The Exterminating Angel (1962), and later in The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie. Confessively, frustration was one of his eternal obsessions, now we will see the nth and maximum frustration, now more addressed and shaped than ever, in the form of sexual frustration of the mature man; by the way, eroticism -another of his eternal topics- and frustration, two of his great themes, merge now. In his final, the master amalgamates both obsessions, naturally spiced with his other particular winks. So, for example we have the symbol of chastity trousers, the complete film can be condensed in that image, that figure, all the martyrdom, all the frustration is printed, it is summarized in that insurmountable impediment, it is the obsession that will never be consumed. Also flows the final detail of the bloodstains, bloodstains that appear at the beginning, when Mathieu asks for Conchita to his butler Martin, then when she is hit by him, and appears again at the end, when he observes through a showcase a woman embroidering, sewing a cloth, again, bloodied. Perhaps it can be interpreted as a symbol, an image referring to Conchita's virginity, the virginal bleeding of a sexual purity that she always claimed, but given her behavior, her chastity ends up being a tremendous enigma. In Buñuel's farewell to the cinema, misogyny looms, citing philosophers the butler says that, if you are going to meet a woman, you should not forget the whip, or stick; it is defined as an obstacle to the total evolution of man, rarely so exemplarily impressed his idea. We have the alter ego of the filmmaker, at the end of his career, unquestionably Fernando Rey becomes his fetish actor, effectively his acting alter ego, now we see him subjected to the whims and dalliances of the hot young girl, frustrated, humiliated, sobs like a child before the weathervane and indecipherable Conchita, who with his chastity pants, strips him of all his dignity, of all his virility. As it was said, surrealism now leaves room for new obsessions, one of the few surreal elements is the detail of the piglet, the pig baby, wrapped in a way like a real human baby, carried by a woman, and treated with naturalness by everyone. It is curious to see that the film is not seen at times as closure to his career, but as a link that could have been continued in that long chain that was his film career. Buñuel says goodbye to the cinema, one of the great luminaries of the European seventh art went out, his loyal Fernando Rey, Milena Vukotic, Julien Bertheau, and even Muni appear briefly; of course, others were missing, his great friend Michel Piccoli comes to mind, but the filmmaker follows the line of the end of his career. Thus ends a brilliant oeuvre, the filmography of probably the greatest spanish filmmaker, a place that can be discussed with Segundo de Chomón, or Luis García Berlanga, but in any case to this group belongs Buñuel, to the greatest, influence of other masters such as Víctor Erice or Carlos Saura. Buñuel would die six years after the release of this film, the human disappeared, but his legacy remains forever, appreciate his art, his cinema, is a pleasure that we can access as simply as appreciating some of his remarkable features. Thanks to the master.

The Phantom of Liberty (1974) - Luis Buñuel

The end for the film career of the great Luis Buñuel was approaching, his cinematographic style was already fully developed, and he had the power, at that point, to be able to shoot his artistic concerns without major constraints. Maintaining the constants of his last years of work, that is, working in collaboration with Jean-Claude Carrière as his co-writer, and the french actors who became his constant companions in that final stage, he creates one of his freest films, probably the greatest in that sense, where all his surrealist force will vigorously flow. It is a film that practically lacks plot, it lacks a conventional synopsis, because, being titled The Phantom of Liberty, what Buñuel does is showing a series of delirious situations, situations in theory absurd, illogical, completely contrasted situations that at the bottom are sliding the usual topics of the filmmaker, an artificial and hypocritical society in its moral postulates, in the laws, among other subjects. One of the most endearing films of the director, which, although it was also one of the movies that most work and sacrifice meant for him, must have been one of the greatest satisfactions the spaniard had, who was already closing his brilliant career, waiting for his latest film.

                   

In 1808, we see Napoleonic soldiers invading spanish soil and carrying out executions, after which, already in the present, some girls receive indecent photographs. The father of one of them is Foucauld (Jean-Claude Brialy), he discovers the photos, famous monuments, then go to the doctor. The nurse of the doctor (Milena Vukotic), must travel to see his sick father, arrives at an inn, where she meets some monks, and the young François (Pierre-François Pistorio), who arrives with his aunt (Hélène Perdrière). Everyone then meets the hatter Berman (Michael Lonsdale), who performs a masochist session. The next morning, she says goodbye to the innkeeper (Paul Frankeur), and takes in her car a teacher, (François Maistre), is a teacher of gendarmes, to whom he refers a unique story about a lunch, defecating in a living room, eating in private. Then, Mr. Legendre (Jean Rochefort) is diagnosed with cancer, he hides it from his wife, he is informed that his daughter has disappeared, and despite the fact that the girl is in his presence, the respective denunciation is made to the police, start the search. Then, a man (Pierre Lary) shoots from the top of a building, kills numerous people, is prosecuted, condemned and released. The police prefect (Julien Bertheau) knows a woman identical to his deceased sister, there is an episode of close necrophilia, he is imprisoned, after which, shots are heard in a zoo.

Thus ends one of the best known films and one that has Buñuel's highest consideration, completely ascribed to his final stage, a surrealism of a certain sophistication, a set of events apparently without the slightest connection or common point, and that, curiously, at the beginning of the film is said to be based on a story by the famous spanish writer Bécquer, although certainly only the initial segment is. This proem situates us in Toledo, 1808, year of Napoleonic invasion, one of the invading characters, in tears, tries to kiss a female statue, receiving physical corrective of the male counterpart, as correcting the excesses of the invaders, subtle figure the slipped, that some politic tint may have. Adequate opening, because in this film we will find, at times, at opinion of the co-writer Carrière, printed some of the greatest concerns and aspirations of surrealism, because Breton defined, in the surrealist manifesto, the moment when contradictions disappeared, as one of the greater peaks of this movement. The black and the white, the day and the night, the defecation in a living room, eating food in the privacy of what is obviously a bathroom, the conventional is shattered, the oppositions lose meaning in the buñuelian picture. "I hate the symmetry," says one man, the same one who says to his wife "you came back", responding her that she did not even come out; "the sea is no longer the sea," he says later, absurd, ridiculous situations are already being slipped, perfectly crowned with the sequence of discovery of the photos, is delighting appreciating the indignation of the libidinous spouses when the images finally reveal themselves. One of the greatest deliriums of the film, one of the greatest entertainments, is undoubtedly when the hatter gives free rein to his morbid hobbies, delirium as exquisite as fun, when his enthusiasm grows as the group of guests increases to his room, who do not imagine what comes next. The dementia of that sequence reaches its climax when everyone sees his wife whipping him, and as everyone quickly retreats upon seeing the masochistic situation, the host utters "at least let the monks remain!", Buñuel's humor at its best.

A doctor tells his patient that he has liver cancer, and after the sudden news, offers him a cigarette, delirium does not stop. "Here I am" indicates later the daughter of the patient, who has just been lost, and who will be intensely searched, is in the noses of adults all the time; a figure, a situation, confessedly desired by the filmmaker, a youth desire that he could not shoot, and that he can now finally capture. Another of the absurd situations, the sniper killer, is condemned in court, then freed from the handcuffs, goes out into the street, to receive acclamations and requests for autographs; it is undoubtedly the film in which the oppositions, the absurd, reach climax in the filmography of spanish, a world where a candle is lit and then light comes on, among so many other contradictions. The referential event, by the way, of group defecation, in public, in a group of toilets, happens after the prolegomenon of the teacher with his gendarmes students, to whom he explains the complex and relative human laws, conventions that are supposed to seek social harmony, but it is precisely that one of the topics that Buñuel attacked most tenaciously during his career, the hypocrisy and double morality of society, which subjugates the individual, suppresses his freedom, making it a phantom. The surrealism of Buñuel has reached its climax in the twilight, does not distil the debauchery of his early years, that easy manner disappears, now that surrealism seems stylized, inserts itself into "logical" situations, and are these antitheses where the power, the strength of the surrealism of the final stage of the filmmaker come from, a kind of disorganization within the organized, destructures the already structured. Now we have many characters, and not six around whom will flow, will gravitate the unlikely events, as happened in the case of The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie (1972), now there are more than a dozen, of greater or lesser importance, but many, it is a parade of deliriums, of absurd situations, although the filmmaker has sometime denied this latter. Shine shoes, car rides, these subtle actions now become vehicles to move from one circumstance to another, connecting the facts, and this because certainly would be all unrelated events, without a natural link, completely non-connected events except for a character who leads, connects with the following situation, articulating the story, structuring a little of what is being related; for example, the inn becomes one of the common points, both for the characters and for the stories to be linked.

He also slides his infallible eroticism, the nurse who changes discreetly and can not stop showing the director some recognizable detail; we will also see the elderly aunt, naked, and the masochist woman changing clothes. Without a doubt, the years, the decades have passed, and the freedoms for that type of images in a film have grown, to Buñuel's approval. The entomologist who is inside will not be absent either, in the figure of the tarantulas shown, and the little girl of the beginning will also change her photos for others ones of arachnids. His bestiary will grow again, the chicken appears, in the form of a rooster now, a Buñuelian element that has always stood out, then a dark figure with a candle, then a bicycle postman, an ostrich, and everything in the spouses' bedroom, all at night, it is the first delirium, the oneiric is already fully embodied, in a scenario that is divided from time, as it is marked by the clock that advances arbitrarily. Religion, another inescapable watchword in the thanks to God atheist filmmaker, is similarly reflected in the acid portrait of the monks, followers of Saint Joseph discussing holiness, whether it is a decoration or not, they are Carmelites who play cards, use scapulars and virgins as bet cards, a delirium that flows quietly, without fuss, almost naturally, the filmmaker is already mature. Another curious incursion of death in the film will be appreciated, with the character who desires his sister, the prefect of police who nobody recognizes as such, protagonist of necrophilic and powerful hint, that we had already seen sketched with the duke and his morbid Addictions in Belle de jour (1967), the sad and famously censored sequence, now presented somewhat more attenuated. Technically, it has also been reached the end stage of the director, with his camera that behaves without any more spectacular or ostentation hints, only with quiet travellings that follow the actions, sliding with resolute serenity. Buñuel finally enjoys with the animals of the Zoo, final interests of spanish emerge, final figures, in the sequence we hear gunshots, a nature for his filmic closure not seen for the first time in the director. He wanted to capture a certain disturbing air in that final, says the iberian, with that ostrich whose elongated eyelashes seemed false, feminine, a surreal ending, an ending like the film. A septuagenarian Buñuel seems to be rolling free of constraints, of constrictions, without compromises or obligations, as if shooting for his own satisfaction, to express his obsessions of youth not consummated; of course, this generates debates, about the real intentions of the director. There is no shortage of those who are outraged by an attitude in the director that they consider excessively playful with the viewer, infuriating some critics. The truth is that the film, once again, should not be looked for an explanation or logical thread. It is the film that most cost the director and screenwriter, more than two years of hard work, but at the same time probably one of the most rewarding for both artists. The giant Buñuel performs his penultimate film, the end was already around the corner, he continues to work with his loyal french actors, the well-known Paul Frankeur, Julien Bertheau, Milena Vukotic and Michel Piccoli, who are joined by the distinguished Michael Lonsdale, Jean Rochefort, among others. The decline of a genius was approaching, some of his majors, and final cinematographic jewels are already getting shape, it was time for the great culmination of his work, That obscure object of desire (1977).