Summary:
A young and innocent girl is taken under the wing of an older guardian after her mother passes away, and soon the guardian begins to make advances towards her.
My Thoughts:
I found Luis Bunuel and Catherine Deneuve’s previous film together, “Belle De Jour”, to be an absolute delight. I reviewed that film as part of our French film series, and it felt only right when preparing for the Spanish series, that I should make an effort to watch Bunuel and Deneuve’s Spanish collaboration. While I must admit, I personally enjoyed “Belle De Jour” more than this film, this movie is certainly worth watching; furthermore, it cemented in my mind how truly diverse Bunuel’s style can be. I’ve only seen a few of his films so far, but he’s quickly risen in my books as a director I need to further familiarize myself with. As for Deneuve, I’ve seen quite a few of her films at this point, and I’ve become quite a fan of her work. Deneuve picks incredibly unique scripts with a diverse range of characters; from the frightened sex-repulsed young Carol in “Repulsion” to the delightfully loveable Genevieve in “The Umbrellas of Cherbourg” to the seductive and troubled Severine in “Belle De Jour”, Deneuve tends to steal scene after scene. She is just as impressive in this film as in her other roles, though I would by no means call her character frightened or lovable or seductive. Deneuve’s character in this movie is something else entirely.
“Life Isn’t As Dark as Many Believe. It’s Snowing Heavily. But We Are Warm in Here.”
After her mother dies, Tristana (Catherine Deneuve, “The Young Girls of Rochefort”) goes to live under the care of Don Lope (Fernando Rey, “The French Connection”). Don Lope is an old fashioned man with a peculiar set of morals, and soon he finds himself drawn to Tristana, and begins to take advantage of her innocence. After Tristana meets a painter named Horacio (Franco Nero, “Django Unchained”) she finds her relationship increasingly strained.
As this is part of our World Cinema Tour: Spain series, I wanted to start this review by saying that this was by far my favorite of the films that I watched for this series, and I would not have expected that going in (the other two films I reviewed for the Spain series were “The Skin I Live In”, and “Biutiful”). This is essentially a melodrama. While I’m making comparisons to movies on the World Tour Series, it felt a bit like Hitchcock’s “Rebecca”: a well-to-do man takes an innocent poor girl in off the streets and invites her into his home, only to cause issues (no the comparison is not perfect, but I kept thinking of that film throughout regardless). There’s an air of tension that pervades this entire film (much like “Rebecca”) that makes it impossible to relax while watching this. While a lot of the movie just revolves around how Tristana herself feels about the romantic situation at hand, the tension that runs through this movie is elevated by Bunuel’s direction and the way he foreshadows darkness. There are strange dream sequences that, at first, feel almost like reality (much like Bunuel’s “Belle De Jour”).
I think one of the things I like most about this movie is the way that it feels as if the ending (which I won’t reveal) feels totally inevitable by the time we get to it, but at the same time it’s still shocking. A lot of this film is just about studying the characters Bunuel has brought to life before us. These characters are strange in that they’re full of contradictions and compelling idiosyncrasies. Don Lope lets a thief go within the first thirty minutes of the movie, because he believes those that are underprivileged should be given a chance. He also claims to be a man of honor, yet at the same time, claims certain commandments from the Ten Commandments were created only for political reasons, and thus, he does not have to follow those commandments that deal with sex. Don Lope is a man that exists on a moral plane constructed for and by only him, and that moral plane continuously causes issues as the film goes on.
Verdict:
To give away this movie’s ending would be to spoil the whole thing.
As I mentioned above, this was by far my favorite film from the Spain Series (though a few of the other directors I’ve checked out have certainly intrigued me). Bunuel is a director who continues to impress, while Deneuve is an actress I continue to admire. This film might be a romantic melodrama, but it has plenty of layers above that as well. The characters in this movie are incredibly complex and at times powerfully compelling. It’s no wonder this movie was nominated for Best Foreign Language Film in 1971; it totally deserved it.
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