Post by Capo on Jul 22, 2007 22:25:31 GMT
La voie lactée
The Milky Way
Luis Buñuel 1969 France / West Germany / Italy
Two pilgrims travel from France to Santiago, encountering multiple forms of heresy on their way.
An ambiguous, complex and often very funny film, very abstract in tone and one of his most visually rich works too, exploring Catholic doctrine and the heresies which oppose or reject it. The director's fascination with Catholicism (and his sophisticated knowledge of it) recalls Godard's obsession with Marxism, though whereas Godard hammered political points home by lifting directly from various literary sources, Buñuel's ultimate ambivalence towards his subject lends a powerfully open tone to proceedings, lifting straight from the Bible and invoking quotes into conversations not to reject anything, really, but to draw up all kinds of hypocrisies and contradictions. Funniest part: when Jesus goes to shave, and His mother tells Him He suits a beard, and therefore keeps His facial hair, along with His would-be iconic visual representation. Most revealing part: the final scene, in which Jesus cures two blind men, only for them to continue (it is suggested) to use their sticks and ears as if sightless.
The Milky Way
Luis Buñuel 1969 France / West Germany / Italy
Two pilgrims travel from France to Santiago, encountering multiple forms of heresy on their way.
An ambiguous, complex and often very funny film, very abstract in tone and one of his most visually rich works too, exploring Catholic doctrine and the heresies which oppose or reject it. The director's fascination with Catholicism (and his sophisticated knowledge of it) recalls Godard's obsession with Marxism, though whereas Godard hammered political points home by lifting directly from various literary sources, Buñuel's ultimate ambivalence towards his subject lends a powerfully open tone to proceedings, lifting straight from the Bible and invoking quotes into conversations not to reject anything, really, but to draw up all kinds of hypocrisies and contradictions. Funniest part: when Jesus goes to shave, and His mother tells Him He suits a beard, and therefore keeps His facial hair, along with His would-be iconic visual representation. Most revealing part: the final scene, in which Jesus cures two blind men, only for them to continue (it is suggested) to use their sticks and ears as if sightless.