Luis Buñuel's "El"... Sex, macho, etc... (1 Viewer)

[Gary Tooze]

"El"
Have any of you seen this marvelous film by director Luis Buñuel ?
I strongly recommend it, not only to Buñuel fans, but to anyone. I have written a short review with some screen captures from the Spanish Region 0 NTSC DVD. CLICK HERE to access it...
Comments welcome and appreciated... btw, the DVD also comes with another Buñuel film: The Criminal Life of Archibaldo de la Cruz" ...
Personally, I find the most compelling thing about Buñuel’s films is their ability to mask rational thought. We can get so wrapped up in the characters and storyline that our logic circuits tend to dismiss irrational contexts, the absurdity of situation, which is probably the exact point. Void of the cloying pretenses and preaching Hollywood films, Buñuel remains faithful to his objectivity, even in the horrid images of a film like Las Hurdes (also available from DVDGO.com on a shared disc with Los Olvidados), which by some are viewed as so ridiculously impoverished that they border on the absurd and comedic. From a technical standpoint, I compare "Las Hurdes" to Resnais "Night and Fog"... long, slow horizontal tracking shots of the landscape, pain, suffering and the kids in it look a lot like concentration camp prisoners... anyway, just trying to spur some conversation other than Crowe, the Oscars and LotR...

 

[Jay E]

Great article Gary & thanks for the info.

I just want to make sure of this - is El available with Archibald or are they 2 separate DVDs? Thanks.

 

[Gary Tooze]

They are together on one DVD Jay... and so are Las Hurdes and Los Olvidados...

I would say, buy away... I am quite happy with them...

Cheers,

 

[Jay E]

Where can you order Los Olvidados & Las Hurdes from? DVDGO does not carry them. Thanks

 

[Gary Tooze]

Hmmm... I don't get it... its where I ( and Al Brown ) bought them from ?
Here is my email from them... and they delivered right away:
YOUR ORDER:
Description: LOS OLVIDADOS (The Young And The Damned) Quantity: 1
Description: ENSAYO DE UN CRIMEN (The Criminal Life Of Archibaldo De La Cruz) Quantity: 1
PAYMENT METHOD: Direct credit card entry
If you have any problem with your order, please contact [email protected]
DVDGOGOSHOP S.L.
Av. Burgos 12
28036 MADRID
SPAIN
???

 

[Jay E]

Gary

This is frustrating. I've been putting in all combinations of those titles in the search and nothing comes up on their website. Either I'm doing something wrong or it is no longer available.

 

[Gary Tooze]

Yeah... I'm trying to Jay... you'd think it would at least come up and say "Not in stock" or something... very mysterious...
but El + The Criminal Life of Archibaldo de la Cruz is still available...
CLICK HERE
Maybe they are having some "copyright" issues.. maybe NOW is the time to get El etc. why you still can... its the better disc anyway...
Cheers,

 

[Jay E]

Thanks Gary!

Archibald is not in stock at this time at dvdgo.com. Anyway, I need to get someone to translate their website for me when I place the order as my knowledge of Spanish is almost nil.

 

[Ike]

Does the El DVD have English Subtitles?

 

[Hendrik]

...both EL and ARCHIBALDO are on a single 'double feature' DVD-9, both movies feature optional English subtitles (and excellent transfers, clean sound)...
. . . . . .

 

[Evan Case]

Gary,
Las Hurdes (AKA: Land Without Bread) is many things: heartbreaking, chilling, dramatic. It is a great film, but it certainly isn't objective.
Examples (unless my memory is shot, in which case I apologize to Bunuel):
- the shot of the snake slithering around the monastery as the narrator talks of how the church owns the majority of the property in the region
- look at the footage of the dying goat: the shots don't match. Bunuel staged the overhead shot of the goat's fall by tossing one he had already killed over the edge. Also, it's rumored that the one in the intial long shot was shot by a rifle in order to make it fall
- the narrator's dismissive description of the mentally retarded (inbred) Hurdanoes as "horrifying."
- much more which I can't recall
Anyway, I'm of the opinion that no documentary is objective, so don't take this as a shot aimed only at Bunuel. Land Without Bread remains an important film, and the four or five fiction films of Bunuel that I've seen have been uniformly excellent.
Evan

 

[Gary Tooze]

I apologize to Bunuel...

Your apologies to Buñuel will fall on deaf ears Evan, but for your misinterpretation, I will accept them in his place
Buñuel's documentary called Las Hurdes (or Land Without Bread) is about the Hurdanos, an inbred people who live in mid-western Spain (close to the Portuguese border). They live not only in squalor but their ridiculous suspicions can cause them starvation. They refuse to eat any of the other farm animals except disease invested pork.
Although Buñuel was making a political statement (actually blaming Franco for the way these people were treated), the images that are showed in the film are so absurd they become surreal (Buñuel = surreal). The original voice-over narrative is mono-tone and if my friends Spanish is accurate (I have no reason to believe it is not, as he was born and lived most of his life in Barcelona!) then what he is saying is laughable... Why? Because it is displayed in such a non-cloying sense. Buñuel used a very practical documentary styling to convey the true horror of these people... he does not request your sympathy... it is instead ripped from you by the images. It is shown as accurate, not melodramatic. In this sense I view it as "objective". The subject matter coveys the shock of "Land Without Bread", not the manner it is filmed. It would have been too easy to make this wrought with weeping women, funerals, death... but instead the everyday life of the Hurdanos is documentary worthy enough.
I'm in the process of my review of this DVD/film right now... and it is a tough call. No one will question that the images are horrible (snakes bite farmers) but looking a little deeper, it is the fact that the adder attacks are not fatal... but rather it is the salve that the villagers put on the wounds that cause them to get infected... is this a stab at their lack of education? or just showing the truth... hmmmm. I suppose if you are of the mind that a documentary cannot be objective... perhaps by definition, I might be in agreement, but the style in which it is done can determine its lack of subjective viewpoint.
As an aside, it remained me very much of Resnais' Night and Fog. Long slow tracking shots – probably done for budget rather than effect, cold French voice for narration, quasi-dark classical music, landscape scenes, and poverty stricken children, often looking malnourished and because they are obviously inbred (some with the shaven head look) not appearing dissimilar to concentration camp prisoners. I couldn't fully understand the dialogue (no subtitles except my Spanish interpreter ), yet I had trouble turning away. Not unlike other Buñuel films, it is the post reflection and reading that allow me to fully appreciate the depth of what the man was attempting to say...
Regards,