Él

Religion and sexuality are among the central themes of Buñuel’s cinema, from Un Chien Andalou to his final film That Obscure Object of Desire. Él is the first of his works in which the relationship between Catholicism and eroticism becomes the central theme and the source of the protagonist’s inner conflict. The striking opening sequence – showing a man attempting to throw a woman from the tower of Mexico City Cathedral – begins with a suggestive, almost erotic image of a bell. Inside the church, a priest washes and kisses the feet of the faithful, filmed by Buñuel in fetishistic close-ups. These first moments introduce a story about the obsessions of an “ideal Catholic bachelor”: jealousy, death, impotence, sin and guilt. The film was also the first feature in which Buñuel constructed the narrative through flashbacks and ellipses, inviting viewers to assemble the puzzle of the story in their own way.

Piotr Kobus

Luis Buñuel (1900–1983) – Spanish surrealist director and one of the greatest filmmakers in world cinema. Having studied in Madrid, he moved to Paris in 1925, where he made An Andalusian Dog and The Golden Age in collaboration with Salvador Dali. His later creative life was divided between Mexico (Los olvidados, Él), Spain (Viridiana, Tristana), and France (Diary of a Chambermaid, Belle de Jour). Faithfully dealing with subjects such as religion, sex, and death, he consistently attacked ossified conventions and exposed the hypocrisy of bourgeois morality.

16th New Horizons IFF Catalogue

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