Three Buñuel masterpieces arrive in remastered Blu-ray presentations, accompanied by excellent new extras. The Exterminating Angel clobbers élitist complacency. The irreverent Simon of the Desert skewers the notion of blessed martyrdom. Viridiana is the shocker that gave Franco’s Spain a slap in the face — and it’s here in a much improved video transfer. Among the new goodies are a commentary from Michael Brooke and video intros from Richard Ayoade, Alex Cox, Guillermo del Toro, and Lulu Wang.

Nothing is Sacred: Three Heresies by Luis Buñuel
Region Free Blu-ray
Radiance
1961-1965 / B&W / 1:66 widescreen / Street Date December 16, 2024 / Available from Radiance / £44.99
Starring: Silvia Pinal, Fernando Rey, Francisco Rabal, Claudio Brook.
Cinematography: Jose F. Aguayo, Gabriel Figueroa,
Original Music: Gustavo Pittaluga, Raul Lavista
Written by Julio Alejandro de Castro, Luis Alcoriza, Luis Buñuel
Produced by Gustavo Alatriste
Directed by Luis Buñuel

As the 1960s came in, Luis Buñuel’s directing career took a sharp upturn. His English-language film  The Young One didn’t take hold, but then he connected with the Mexican businessman Gustavo Alatriste, who wanted to produce movies to star his wife, Silvia Pinal. Over five years the trio made three remarkable films — two and a half films, actually. The first was an affront to Fascist Spain, calculated to ignite a scandal. The second two saw Buñuel return to his surrealist roots.

Criterion has released good editions of these Alatriste pictures, but for this collection the English label Radiance was able to tap new 4K restorations for all three. The assembled extras are second to none. We only regret that our check discs to review Nothing is Sacred: Three Heresies by Luis Buñuel did not include the collection’s accompanying book, with its wealth of text essays.

Viridiana
1961 / 91 min. / Viridiana
Starring: Silvia Pinal, Francisco Rabal, Fernando Rey, José Calvo, Margarita Lozano, Claudio Brook, Rosarita Yarza.
Cinematography: José F. Aguayo
Set Decoration: Francisco Canet
Film Editor: Pedro del Rey
Original Music: Gustavo Pittaluga
Written by Julio Alejandro de Castro, Luis Buñuel from a novel by Benito Pérez Galdós
Produced by Gustavo Alatriste
Directed by Luis Buñuel

Talk about setting film history aflame — after fleeing Franco’s Spain and taking twenty years to rebuild a new career in commercial moviemaking, Luis Buñuel got a revenge of sorts with his provocative  Viridiana.  Invited back from exile, the director delivered a movie guaranteed to be banned. The Spanish establishment didn’t tolerate slights against The Church, and Buñuel’s tale of a devout nun’s degradation sent them through the roof. Banned in Spain, the film was not shown there until 1977.

The irony is that Viridiana is in not conventionally exploitative. Buñuel presents a few provocative images, but the film’s power lies in its blunt challenge to the audience. It demolishes sentimental illusions — the goodness of the poor, the worth of charity, the idealism of human nature. It’s the true relationship between Christian ideals and the real world, as taught by Buñuel.

Before taking her final vows, convent novitiate Viridiana (Silvia Pinal) visits her Uncle and benefactor Don Jaime (Fernando Rey), an eccentric who conducts an unhealthy worship of his dead wife. The gullible Viridiana accedes to her uncle’s ‘innocent’ request that she dress up in her aunt’s wedding gown. When she turns down his wedding proposal, Don Jaime opts for the next best thing: he drugs his niece, and carries her to his ‘wedding bed.’  The necrophiliac attempt to recreate a tragic wedding night veers deep into Gothic horror; it may have been a direct inspiration for Riccardo Freda’s The Horrible Dr. Hichcock (also in a superb Radiance restoration).

Although Don Jaime does not carry out his fiendish plan, Viridiana considers herself compromised. Instead of returning to the convent she stays to manage Don Jaime’s properties, and to devote herself to charity. She’s joined by her cousin Jorge (Francisco Rabal), a pragmatic realist who wants to improve the house. Viridiana collects a retinue of homeless beggars and vagrants, who are all too happy to play ‘worthy poor’ under her roof. But Viridiana’s efforts go disastrously wrong. The movie carries a wickedly ironic charge, a cruel but funny commitment to the absurd logic of events.

Buñuel claimed to be an atheist, yet his films are the work of an artist wrestling with Catholic thoughts etched deeply into his psyche. His work is often described as heartless and cold, by viewers expecting sentimental reassurance.

The imagery abounds with objects bearing magical, surreal qualities. Viridiana carries a bag of items that could a be kit for a crucifixion — hammer, nails, a crown of thorns. She’s no less obsessed than her Uncle. Later on we see a small crucifix that doubles as a hidden flick-knife, an unpleasant item reportedly common in Spain.

Buñuel makes an uncomfortable ‘running gag’ out of a child’s jump-rope. Don Jaime gives it to the maid’s daughter, perhaps so he can watch her legs while she plays. The rope is later connected to the mortal sin of suicide. Much later, one of the filthy beggars offhandedly steals the jumprope to hold his pants up. An object loaded with symbolic significance devolves by stages into something non-threatening.

Viridiana’s desire to form a little community of peace and good will runs up against both the beggars that abuse her kindness, and the pragmatic and egotistical Jorge. He takes advantage of the maid Ramona as casually as he accepts the exit of his former mistress. Jorge’s seduction of Ramona is represented by a cat pouncing on a rat.

The most caustic observation about Christian charity is a wickedly keen parable involving a poor little dog, tied to a donkey cart and forced to run or be dragged to death. One must do good deeds for the right reasons, not for appearance, or to feel better about one’s self.

In the end Viridiana indeed earns its ‘blasphemous’ reputation. The out-of-control beggars’ feast is a vulgar display of the unwashed and unworthy at their worst. Buñuel impishly recreates the famous painting of The Last Supper, as the centerpiece of an orgy. The night turns into a destructive, predatory nightmare that puts Viridiana into a state of shock. Buñuel’s idea of Hell is a card game and American Rock ‘n Roll … a device he would repeat in Simon of the Desert to literally represent Hell.

Radiance’s Blu-ray of  Viridiana is touted as a new 4K restoration from ‘the original negatives.’  There are newer European discs that we haven’t seen, but this transfer is a big improvement over Criterion’s DVD from 2006. Contrast and sharpness are much improved, and bits of damage here and there are gone. The audio track seems cleaner as well.

The audio commentary says that, when Buñuel disobeyed the Spanish government and took Viridiana to Cannes in May of 1961, he anticipated that it might be seized. Silvia Pinal had already taken a finished print to Mexico, and Buñuel’s son reportedly took a good printing element to France. Is it possible that this new restoration uses a heretofore un-sourced film element?  We weren’t supplied with Radiance’s insert book, which may spell it out.

That audio commentary by Michael Brooke is the key new extra on Viridiana. Brooke is a terrific communicator — he talks at a breakneck pace yet conveys his thoughts with perfect clarity, layering information with great skill. He interrupts the making-of story with keen observations. The analysis of the film’s touchy content also holds our interest. We audit a great many commentaries, and Brooke’s name has become a guarantee of time well spent.

A full list of extras is below. Radiance completed some of them barely two months ago. The introduction on Viridiana is by Lulu Wang (The Farewell), who remarks at the audacity of Buñuel’s images, like the cow teat that Viridiana can’t make herself handle. She cites Buñuel’s ‘shamelessness’ as an entirely positive quality.

The Exterminating Angel
1962 / 93 min. / El ángel exterminador
Starring: Silvia Pinal, Jacqueline Andere, Augusto Benedicio, José Baviera, Antonio Bravo, Claudio Brook, Rosa Elena Durgel, Lucy Gallardo, Tito Junco.
Cinematography: Gabriel Figueroa
Production Designer:
Art Director: Jús Bracho
Costume Design: Georgette Somohano
Film Editor: Carlos Savage
Original Music: Raúl Lavista
Based on a story by Luis Alcoriza, Luis Buñuel
Produced by Gustavo Alatriste
Written and Directed by Luis Buñuel

Luis Buñuel remained in Spain just long enough to toss a pie in the face of Francisco Franco. The success of Viridiana boosted his partnership with Gustavo Alatriste and Silvia Pinal. Filmed in Mexico,  The Exterminating Angel   is a return to the director’s surrealist roots. A frontal attack on the haute bourgeoisie, it’s cultured follow-up to the director’s notorious  L’Age D’or of thirty years before.

Attending a late night post-opera dinner, twenty prosperous Mexican socialites discover that, even though nothing bars their exit, they cannot leave to go home. They at first avoid the issue, as they do other social embarrassments. But soon enough the food runs out, and the servants leave. The guests must break a pipe to get water. An engaged couple hides in a closet to be alone. All want the problem to go away, but there is little cooperation in the search for a solution.

Forget the rational storyline of Viridiana: the premise here purposely makes no sense. Even before trouble breaks out, the guests hint at ugly ideas and antisocial compulsions lurking beneath their good manners. They laugh off inconveniences and make polite excuses because doing otherwise is below their dignity.

The party guests soon lose their civility. Good friends hurl insults and accusations at one another. The women make evasive small talk about religion. Two guests appear to have some kind of illegal scheme going on. Nothing is explained, especially not a box produced by the host, that contains heroin and cocaine. His wife never gets a chance to sneak upstairs with her lover.

One man purposely throws away some pills he knows another guest badly needs. A guest dies and others are driven close to madness. Just as outright savagery threatens, one of the ladies (Sylvia Pinal) proposes a strangely logical solution. Will they escape?

The whole point of the movie is that we have absolutely no idea what will happen next, yet every new complication suggests that some kind of explanation is just around the corner. Occasional cuts to the street reveal that the authorities outside are just as frustrated. They’re in the same bind: nobody attempts to enter the house. They just can’t do it.

The finale is not at all reassuring. As with many of the director’s films, it offers the possibility that a revolution is underway.
Even the plumbing is a conspiracy.

The Exterminating Angel avoids easy cinematic jokes, but it does play strange games with movie logic. Some moments are repeated, as in the later  Last Year in Marienbad.  A lady guest reports that she lifted a toilet lid, and saw clouds and an eagle flying, as if the mansion were high in the air. A crawling, murderous hand connects The Exterminating Angel with, of all things, Robert Florey’s  The Beast with Five Fingers — which Buñuel reportedly helped write and develop while working at Warners.

The Exterminating Angel is ‘savagely elegant.’  It is important to remember that Buñuel’s surrealist ethic is sourced in a bottomless political rage. The underlying subject is the inherent inequity and injustice in the social status quo. We’re fast approaching a point at which absurd political realities outpace any outrage an artist could dream up, even Luis Buñuel.

We are given to understand that Stephen Sondheim’s last musical play  Here We Are, written with David Ives, was based on this movie and Buñuel’s  The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie.

Radiance says that its encoding of  The Exterminating Angel is a new 4K scan they themselves commissioned, so we’re wondering why it was remastered full-frame, instead of given a 1.66 or 1:85 aspect ratio. Did Buñuel want the films screened flat?  Or is it simple economics, that the film’s rights holder doesn’t want the expense of maintaining multiple digital masters?

The hour-long 1997 documentary on the director’s rich middle career in Mexico is a repeat from an earlier Criterion disc. Filmmaker Emilio Maillé visits the field that Buñuel rented for Simon of the Desert and finds one of the original pillars still in place. Rare film clips accompany interviews with actors, screenwriters, producers and Buñuel’s wife. We’re also shown an unused alternate “happy” ending for Los Olvidados that would have seen service had the film not won awards overseas.

A new video essay by Alexandra Heller-Nicholas examines the film’s ritual dinner party in greater detail. Directors Alex Cox and Guillermo Del Toro deliver lengthy introductions. Cox sketches the director’s career arc, and shows a rare photo of Buñuel greeting none other than Marilyn Monroe on the set of Exterminating Angel. Del Toro ties the director’s philosophy to the madness of Mexican culture, a combination of beauty and horror. We’re glad that both directors cover one important factoid that is often overlooked, the political betrayal of Buñuel by his former collaborator, Salvador Dalí.

Simon of the Desert
1965 / 45 min. / Simón del desierto
Starring: Claudio Brook, Silvia Pinal, Francisco Regueira.
Cinematography: Gabriel Figueroa
Film Editor: Carlos Savage Jr.
Original Music: Raúl Lavista
Screenplay by Luis Buñuel, Julio Alejandro
Produced by Gustavo Alatriste
Directed by Luis Buñuel

1965’s  Simon of the Desert aims Buñuel’s surrealist lampoon at another favorite target, Christian doctrine. The wickedly funny look at piety and temptation is the director’s third effort for producer Gustavo Alatriste. The one caveat of Alatriste’s patronage was that a key role be provided for his wife, Silvia Pinal. The star of  Viridiana has an even more demanding part to play, as various incarnations of The Devil Himself.

¡Apártate de mi, Satanás!

In a dusty desert, the saintly Simon (Claudio Brook) stands atop a stone pillar, seeking to purify his soul by physically removing himself from worldly things. Various monks attend to Simon, who is too humble to accept holy orders. Simon’s first pillar is only about ten feet tall. A grateful merchant cured by Simon’s prayers builds him a 25-footer, placing the bearded ascetic like a landmark under the clear skies. But the high perch cannot protect Simon from the temptations of Satan.

Buñuel’s Simon is a disciple of  Saint Simeon Stylites, an historical Syrian ascetic; Holy men lecturing from atop pillars were apparently not a rare thing in ancient times. Rather than mock the scriptures, Buñuel illustrates Simon’s vulnerability. When Simon performs authentic miracles, a monk grumbles that ‘this spiritual nonsense is getting out of hand.’  Other monks try to bog him down with doctrinal terms, and others are simply jealous jerks and joy-killers. The ascetic isn’t likely to find a kindred spirit in this world.

The locals are even more distracting. Simon’s mother decides to live in a tent at the bottom of the pillar. A dwarf goatherd interferes with Simon’s fasting by giving him unwanted bread and milk. The crowds are never satisfied, even when Simon performs good miracles.  ^*  A thief wants Simon to restore his missing hands. The parable is mean-spirited, yet more truthful than a bushel of Hallmark homilies.

The one person who appreciates Simon is The Devil (Silvia Pinal). He tempts the holy man in different forms, mostly female. We first see Satan as a beautiful water bearer (with demonic hands) who breaks the holy concentration of some monks. Satan then manifests as a little girl in a sailor suit, taunting Simon with a perverse song and showing him her ‘innocent’ legs and breasts. He even comes disguised as God, with golden locks and a beard. The presence of The Devil ought to be a good sign, as his existence proves that God exists. But Simon’s fate is to become a burlesque straight man. “As for God’s son,” says Satan, “I could tell you a few things about him.”

At one point Buñuel evokes G.W. Murnau’s surrealist favorite  Nosferatu, with a coffin that moves by itself. The abrupt finish transports Simon directly to what Satan says is Hell. Buñuel’s vision of damnation is a sour joke, the kind of fantasy an ‘old guy’ might come up with. Simon’s fate seems very much like the sad finish of Nicolas Roeg’s  The Man Who Fell to Earth, a lonely exile in a strange land.

Simon of the Desert is only 45 minutes in duration. One story says that it was planned to be a chapter in an omnibus film, with other short films to be directed by Federico Fellini and Jules Dassin. Another says that the producer’s funding ran out before Buñuel could film a number of scenes. When the show saw theatrical screenings, it was usually doubled up with another short feature, often Orson Welles’  The Immortal Story.

Presented in nigh-perfect condition,  Simon of the Desert is also framed at 1:37. The blocking of the main credits show that it was intended for widescreen projection, but the open-matte transfer doesn’t offend. Gabriel Figueroa’s stark cinematography avoids ‘elegant’ pictorial effects. A gliding camera crane animates what is basically a static situation. For a music soundtrack, Buñuel scores the picture with somber choral recordings.

Performer and personality Richard Ayoade provides the introduction for Simon, and Abraham Castillo Flores contributes an excellent visual essay on Buñuel’s work with Alatriste and Pinal. Flores reminds us of the director’s hearing problems, and offers a rich personal portrait of his personality.

The Radiance release presents the Alatriste Buñuels in excellent condition. We particularly appreciate the visual improvement with Viridiana. Our only nitpick would be the flat transfers on the other two, as we remember them exhibited widescreen, in 35mm.

CineSavant reviewed from check discs, and can’t report directly about the the packaging. We also know little about the thick insert booklet provided. Radiance’s description is below.

Just to see what we had of Luis Buñuel, we laid out the contents of our shelves. The image can be enlarged.  →  We once saw excellent 35mm prints of Los olvidados and  Él, but that was 50 years ago. We’ve seen shabby copies on PBS of the truly great Subir al cielo and  La illusión viaja en tranvía. We’ve never seen watchable presentations of  Abismos de pasión,  El río y la muerte, or the poetically titled  Cela s’appelle l’aurore with Lucia Bosè.

Here’s a nice article by Steve Mcfarlane about Luis Buñuel’s short-lived job at New York’s  Museum of Modern Art, from February of 2024. MoMA presented an impressive retrospective of Buñuel’s Mexican films, and  the website is still up. I wish all the films they screened were more widely available.

Reviewed by Glenn Erickson

Nothing is Sacred: Three Heresies by Luis Buñuel
Region Free Blu-ray rates:
Movies: Excellent
Video: Excellent
Sound: Excellent
Supplements (Radance’s text):
Newly filmed appreciations for each film and Buñuel by filmmakers Richard Ayoade, Alex Cox, Guillermo del Toro, and Lulu Wang (2024, 55 mins)
The Life and Times of Don Luis Buñuel – A BBC Arena documentary on Buñuel featuring contributions from Buñuel and collaborators including Catherine Deneuve, presented on Blu-ray for the first time (1983, 101 mins)
A Mexican Buñuel – A documentary directed by Emilio Maillé on Buñuel’s Mexican period (1995, 56 mins)
Buñuel: A Surrealist Filmmaker – A feature-length documentary directed by Javier Espada on Buñuel’s life and career, presented on Blu-ray for the first time (2021, 84 mins)
An interview with Buñuel from 1964 recorded for French TV’s Cinéastes de notre temps (1964, 48 mins)
The Other Trinity: Alatriste, Buñuel and Pinal – A visual essay on Buñuel in Mexico by Abraham Castillo Flores (2024, 34 mins)
Dinner and Other Rituals – A visual essay on The Exterminating Angel and the dinner party on film by critic and writer Alexandra Heller-Nicholas (2024, 17 mins)
Audio commentary on Viridiana by critic Michael Brooke (2024)
Limited edition 80-page book featuring new writing by Glenn Kenny, Justine Smith, Lindsay Hallam and David Hering, as well as archive material.
Deaf and Hearing-impaired Friendly? YES; Subtitles: English (feature only)
Packaging: One Blu-ray in Keep case
Reviewed: November 23, 2024
(7231luis)

^*   That is indeed human nature. Take video disc collectors: every anticipated disc is a modern miracle — ‘imagine, playing a movie whenever I want to see it’ — but every ‘miraculous’ release is greeted with grudging complaints, and soon forgotten.

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