Luis Buñuel's 1962 surrealist masterpiece is, on the surface at least, a very simple movie. It's very remise is nothing if not basic. It's what the movie does with that most rudimentary of ideas that makes it so impressive. Really, at its core, the film is nothing more than a dinner party. A group of upper crust socialites arrive at a beautiful mansion for a dinner party. We see them enter twice, from two different angles, an early indicator of the film's duplicitous nature. Repetition soon becomes a prominent theme in the film.

The guests are about to sit down to eat but before they do, the servants and kitchen staff take off leaving the mistress of the house understandably angry. She's upset not only because she'd planned on having the help around for the meal, but also for the after dinner entertainment wherein they'd assist in a live show involving a bear and some sheep. Regardless, the guests enjoy themselves as they feast, gossip and make digs subtle and not so subtle throughout the conversation. It's clear that we're not meant to like these people, as there's very little that's likeable about any of them. Don't think for a second that isn't intentional.

The meal ends and they retire to a sitting room wherein one of the men, a doctor, tells one of the female guests she has only a week left to enjoy her hair, he predicts she will soon go bald. The party goes on into the night as parties often do and, just as it would be at any other social gathering, people eventually tire and prepare to leave. The difference here is that they can't. They go through the motions, even going so far as to get their coats and walk towards the exit, but they never do it. Likewise, no one is able to enter the house, no the military, not a simple child. They can't come in. For reasons never made obvious to the audience, these characters are trapped in the house and completely shut off from the outside world. Eventually they simply accept it and they decide to settle in for the evening and spend the night. As this plays out, their true personalities come to light and we realize that they're not just unlikeable, no, many of them are quite sinister, maybe even evil. And the hours turn into days, and the days and there is no exit, no end game, in sight… chaos erupts and high society soon begets anarchy.

The director's tendencies to hold up a magnifying glass to the hypocrisies he saw in the bourgeois class was a big part in almost all of his films but here it is the central core. By placing these characters in what you could say is their natural environment, a high class social event complete with all the trimmings, Buñuel is able to peel back the layers of the different characters and show them for the money grubbing nihilists he well and truly believed many of the upper class to be. It's a fascinating picture loaded with pitch black comedy and a whole lot of bizarre, even morbid, detail. The more times you see the film, the more you get out of it. You'll pick up on things on repeat viewings that you didn't notice the first, second or even third time around. There's a lot of symbolism here, and as you grow accustomed to the director's style and take in more of his filmed output, the comedy seems more effective. Without going on a political diatribe, in many ways this film, clearly a thinly veiled attack on those who held the political and financial power in the director's native Spain (from which he was exiled) under Franco's rule, is more relevant than ever. These people cannot leave the party, and clearly the party in this instance isn't just meant to be a gathering of people intent on revelry.

Gabriel Figueroa's cinematography is beautiful, bizarre and striking and the black and white photography does an excellent job of capturing the mood and atmosphere that the director manages to conjure up. The performances are all spot on, embodying all the traits you would expect given the premise and the characters that populate this strange story. It comes together remarkably well, and it winds up a picture that is as thought provoking and enthralling as it is bizarre and, at times, disturbing.

Video:

The Exterminating Angel arrives on a 50GB Blu-ray from The Criterion Collection in high definition for the first time. This was not advertised as a new scan as many of the label's releases are, and you do have to wonder if this is the same transfer used for the DVD release, albeit given a fair bit more breathing room and presented in proper 1080p high definition instead of down-converted to standard definition. This is an improvement over that DVD but not a massive one. Obviously there's less compression which is always a plus, but the uptick in detail (and there is one) won't leave your jaw on the floor. Grain appears more prominent and provides better texture without overpowering the picture. This is more film-like than the DVD. The image is in nice shape, showing very little in the way of print damage, scratches, dirt or debris. Black levels are fine and contrast looks good. This looks alright, but some may be disappointed that it didn't look a little better (as it probably could have if it had been afforded a new scan).