UN CHIEN ANDALOU
(AN ANDALUSIAN DOG)

Bunuel and painter Salvador Dali created this classic surrealist short film,
which is essentially a barrage of striking and irrational images designed
to shock and provoke.   Some of the more memorable sights: a close-up of
a woman's eye being slashed open with a razor; a man dragging a piano, two
bishops, and a pair of rotting dead donkeys across a room simultaneously;
ants swarming around a hole in a man's palm.  Originally a silent film,
Bunuel later added a recorded score consisting of "Liebestod" from
the Wagner opera "Tristan und Isolde", and vintage tango music.

L'AGE D'OR
(THE GOLDEN AGE)

Bunuel's masterpiece extols love and attacks religion and the social
order in an amazing assemblage of images that remain as provocative
today as they were in 1930.   Its central metaphor is of a couple making
love who are continually disturbed by the intrusions of officialdom, police
and the Church.   Financed by the Vicomte de Noailles, who gave Bunuel
complete freedom and declared it "exquisite and delicious," the film
immediately became the object of right-wing extremists and remained
unseen for generations because of the Church's threat to excommunicate
the Vicomte if the film were distributed.  Co-scripted by Salvador Dali.

LAS HURDES
(LAND WITHOUT BREAD)

Bunuel's only documentary, telling the story of the horrifically poverty-
stricken people living in the Las Hurdes region of Spain.   Bunuel
constructed the film in the manner of a travelogue, with a light musical
score and matter-of-fact narration.  The absurdity of the contrast between
narration and image results in a vision so powerful the film seems surreal.

SIMON OF THE DESERT

An intriguing tale of spiritual quest and temptation.   A 5th century ascetic
stands atop a pedestal in constant prayer.  He takes only minimal sustenance
and rejects any attempts to distract him.  The devil appears in several in-
carnations, always as a woman. The image of the devil as a beautiful, golden
haired, bearded woman carrying a lamb in her arms is unforgettable.  Often
called "the greatest short film of all time", Bunuel's wit was never  sharper
or more biting, his surrealist vision never clearer.   Classic shock ending.

FEATURE FILMS

LOS OLVIDADOS
(THE YOUNG AND
THE DAMNED)

A milestone of filmmaking;  Bunuel's searing film looks at the lives of young
people growing up in the slums of Mexico, and in particular, at the desperately
inevitable process by which an older, more corrupt gang leader, Jacob, hounds
and destroys the younger, more innocent Pedro, before being destroyed himself.

NAZARIN

A simple priest tries to live by Christian precepts in one of Luis Bunuel's best films.
"I am very much attached to Nazarin," said Bunuel. "He is a priest. He could as
well be a hairdresser or a waiter. What interests me about him is that he stands
by his ideas, that these ideas are unacceptable to society at large, and that
after his adventures with prostitutes, thieves and so forth, they lead him
to being irrevocably damned by the prevailing social order."

VIRIDIANA

Bunuel's outrageous and devastating attack on religion and society. Viridiana,
about to take her vows as a nun, takes to the pure Christian life by organizing a
haven for a blind man, a leper, a cripple and a beggar. Full of Freudian symbolism,
the film ends in a famous orgy of destruction, containing Bunuel's blasphemous
parody of the Last Supper. The film that got Bunuel kicked out of Spain.

THE EXTERMINATING ANGEL

A metaphorically rich and comic film, the story of a group of guests invited
to an elegant dinner party who find they are unable to leave at the end of
the evening. A mysterious force compels them to stay… and stay…and stay.
After several days, their well-heeled social facades collapse as hunger,
thirst, fear, and boredom send them into a frenzy.  Bunuel stated that
this film is "a metaphor, a deeply felt, disturbing  reflection of the life of
modern man, a witness to the fundamental preoccupations of our time."

TRISTANA

Catherine Deneuve is Tristana, a victim of her own captivating beauty who is desired
by two men. The first is her lecherous guardian (Fernando Rey)  who, after raising
her from a teenager, takes her as his mistress. The other  is a young artist (Franco
Nero) who wants to marry her but lacks the courage to free her from the corrupt
relationship with her guardian. Set in 1920's Spain, Tristana is a scathing examina-
tion of moral decay viewed through Bunuel's typically dispassionate and ironic eyes.

THE FALL OF THE
HOUSE OF USHER

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