1961 Directed by Luis Buñuel
Viridiana is preparing to start her life as a nun when she is sent, somewhat unwillingly, to visit her aging uncle, Don Jaime. He supports her; but the two have met only once. Jaime thinks Viridiana resembles his dead wife. Viridiana has secretly despised this man all her life and finds her worst fears proven when Jaime grows determined to seduce his pure niece. Viridiana becomes undone as her uncle upends the plans she had made to join the convent.
薇丽狄雅娜, 华丽迪安娜, 비리디아나, Вірідіана, Виридиана, Βιριδιάνα, ვირიდიანა, 维莉蒂安娜, 薇麗狄雅娜
France
Cannes Film Festival
FranceTP
MexicoB-15
Spain18
Russian Federation16+
UK15
USA
UK15
FranceTP
France
Mexico
Russian Federation
Spain
UK
USA
Viridiana isn't a good person. She's barely a person. She may seem virtuous and humble but at the core there's a self-righteousness that's prideful and disgusting. Bunuel was a known Anti-Catholic. It's not in the subtext but in the overtures. At the surface, Viridiana is about a nun falling from the grace of God, but it's the characters around her who are pure. While Viridiana is busy isolating her thoughts, human animals are living in God's image. Unnecessary Shame compels her to divorce from the calling she once held sacred. Her "charity" is the beginning of her own undoing.
The beggars are heart of this film. They aren't good, they aren't bad, they just are. Humans doing as humans do.…
Part of the 30 Days in May challenge, 2014 edition
Mexico
This is my third dinner party with Mr. Buñuel . Our previous engagements, The Discreet Charm and Exterminating Angel were both memorable meals. From this limited exposure Buñuel appears to pick some obvious targets; the upper middle class, religion and morality in the above, and play with them much like a cat will toy with their prey. Add a dollop of absurdity, wrap it around banquet, and you get a savory feast.
Viridiana was a bit more beguiling, as the signature absurdity seemed to be absent, or, significantly more pale. Here, it seems that virtue and piety are in the crosshairs; with religion, of course, as the usual side…
what have i done?
i’ve destroyed them. i’ve broken her. i’ve ruined them all!
i deserve no life, i deserve so little. i deserve to be shown the gates of hell and for them to fall flat on my face.
my punishment should be so great that i am not even given the satisfaction of any life, the satisfaction of life in itself.
but…
perhaps it’s not so bad.
is it bad? perhaps if i frame it a certain way. if i build up a broad image of what i believe this world to be, if i create a place so great that i may live in it…
if i create a painting… yes (that’s it!) a painting!
it’s true,…
***One of the best 150 films I have ever seen.***
SPANISH REVIEW:
Ser un personal admirador de Luis Buñuel conlleva, de alguna manera, demasiada responsabilidad en cuanto a admiración artística y estética se refiere. Prohibida en España y totalmente denunciada por el Vaticano, Viridiana es una de las mejores películas española de todos los tiempos, una coproducción escandalosa con México que alude al despertar del espiritualismo del ser humano y referencia las emociones más controversiales que una persona, independientemente de sus creencias y posturas religiosas en particular, suele guardar en las capas más íntimas de su persona. Buñuel aún se aferra al estilo de La Edad de Oro del cine mexicano y le añade simbolismos pequeños encarnados por objetos que…
"I went through a great shock, I am only trying to recover."
Such a deeply cynical film that you can feel Buñuel's hatred for the fascist Franco dictatorship in the very texture of every frame. The world itself is a test of Viridiana's faith, continually confronting her with the darkest depths of humanity's sinful depravity, rewarding her conviction with nothing but more hardship, asking at every turn, "What about now? Do you still believe?" How is anyone supposed to have faith in such a corrupt and twisted world? The infamous dinner party scene becomes a microcosm of Spain's political environs: the bourgeois fascist state is a juvenile food fight where the guests have no respect for the house, where they trash the place, stuff their faces, and fuck in the corner, destroying everything in their irreverent bacchanalia.
"I was so happy… You ruined everything."
Good intentions, the killer of humanity.
You're a good person. You repent for your sins, if you have any. You repent for the sins of others, oh they are so full of them. Sinners. The word rolls on your tongue, easily, it gives you pleasure. To think you're a saint among sinners. A creature to be worshipped. Oh, sure, you say you are not, and you don't really believe it, do you? Still, when they say it, the sensation is intoxicating. Aren't we all craving for gratification? For that feeling of total control over someone? It's good you don't sin, you can lead the others towards goodness. But, if you do... What's left for you? Who will treat you like…
Spanish film director Luis Buñuel frequently induced disagreement and debate with his movies, and Viridiana prompted the most boisterous reception since the spectacular commotion for L'age d'or back in 1930. Based loosely on the 1895 book Halma by novelist Benito Pérez Galdós, it contains neatly laid bricks of provocation stacked to bring about a barricade of defiance against supporters of Francisco Franco as well as outright condemnation from the Vatican who claimed the film was sacrilegious.
There's a fair amount of his trademark surrealist touches liberally sprinkled throughout, but they are constantly organic to the storytelling, and it additionally adheres to a traditional three-act structure. It furthermore manages to be unaccompanied by patronising superiority in the multiple and hefty critiques of its characters, and while there's no misconstruing the inflammatory qualities of the film, the narrative arrangement of Buñuel’s beliefs are incorporated here much more conventionally than usual.
Part of the 2014 30 countries challenge, Film #17 - Mexico
I don't think I have ever hated a film as much as I hate this one. I hated every single thing about it. I wanted every one of the characters to go hang themselves. I wanted to sit Buñuel down and slap him silly. The "last supper" did me in. By this point I kept watching to see if it could get any worse. Last time I watched a film with that in mind was The Joy Luck Club. I can't decide between the two which I hate more, although I'm leaning towards this one.
You know when a Luis Buñuel movie starts with Handel’s “Messiah” that you’re in for some delicious blasphemy.
“Viridiana” is a prime cut of it from the deepest reaches of the inferno.
Buñuel’s fable about a wayward nun shows that the road to hell is paved with the corruptibility of selectively good intentions. Playing God with the doling out of charity is still playing God.
It takes the likes of Buñuel - maestro of fantastical fetish - to conclude that serving all masters.. whatever their needs... is the closest one can come to victory in piety.
Buñuel’s surrealist imagery is at its best and most unholy in “Viridina.” The infamous Last Supper scene, which caused the work to be…
A drowning religion losing potency inside a woman on the verge of the ultimate sacrifice. A woman willing to offer her life to the church. On the verge of her consecration, increasingly cruel acts of selfish desire from her only remaining relative send her world spiraling.
Born of a director that started out as an avant-garde surrealist, this is a darker, meaner Luis Buñuel and world away from films like The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie, That Obscure Object of Desire and Un Chien Andalou. This is the Spanish director as a moody and vicious donor of hurtful moments, and despite the inherent darkness of Viridiana he manages to hold the narrative together with calm and sparing dialogue from only…
Thanks to Michael Chan for recommending me this film, as well as for buying me the DVD.
A murky depiction of faith, Viridiana is fascinating arthouse fare that deals with the darkness inherent within people and perhaps the limitations of the divine. The film is filled with various allusions to Christianity, through imagery and the narrative. The twisted approach the film takes to ideas such as virginity and charity are limit-pushing versions of Christian values. The film's ultimate conclusion seems to be that people are undeserving of religious kindness, or that religion itself is too idealised for pragmatic reality. The titular character goes through many tests of faith and self, and one wonders where she finally ends on the spectrums…
