The Movie:

The Criterion Collection brings together three of filmmaker Luis Buñuel's final, and better known pictures, with their aptly titled Three Films By Luis Buñuel collection. Here's what is contained inside.

The Discreet Charm Of The Bourgeoisie (1972):

The first film in the set revolves around three well-to-do couples: Henri Sénéchal (Jean-Pierre Cassel) and his wife Alice (Stéphane Audran), François Thévenot (Paul Frankeur) and his wife Simone (Delphine Seyrig), a woman named Florence (Bulle Ogier) and Don Rafael (Fernando Rey), an ambassador stationed in France originally from a Central American country named Miranda currently suffering some political strife. In fact, Rafael spends much of his time worrying about being assassinated by a young woman he sees quite often who he believes to be a terrorist.

When the film begins, the Sénéchals have the other four over to their home for what they expect will be a nice meal, only to arrive a day before their hosts were expecting them. Without a meal ready, they decide to head to a nearby restaurant only to find that it is under new ownership and holding a viewing of a corpse in the back room. Sometime later they gather at the Sénéchals place again, seemingly unaware that Henri and Alice are out having sex in the garden outside. Another attempt to have dinner together sees them realize that they're on a stage in front of an audience while yet another attempt sees their meal interrupted by a military drill.

A reasonably plotless film, The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie still manages to hold our attention. It's a bizarre picture, but quite an amusing one, often times very funny in its own strange way. Not surprisingly, Buñuel introduces elements of surrealism into the picture, which results in the film showing off some truly memorable visuals on a somewhat regular basis. The picture is also rife with social commentary, our wealthy characters often portrayed as aloof and out of touch with much of what is happening around them. The film is nicely shot and the fancy locations where much of the story plays out fit the tone of the picture very well.

The movie also benefits from a really solid cast. Rey is excellent here as the somewhat paranoid ambassador, particularly (without spoiling things) towards the end where he's confronted at a fancy party about his country's situations. The beautiful Stéphane Audran is also very good here, as is Cassel, the two of them are really solid in their roles. Also look out for a supporting turn from Milena Vukotic (instantly recognizable from Blood For Dracula as Ines, the Sénéchal's maid.

The Phantom Of Liberty (1974):

Made two years later, The Phantom Of Liberty zips all across the timeline of history, beginning during the Napoleonic era as the French commander's army lays siege to Toledo in 1818. When it turns out that some of those on the other side reject the freedom the intruding forces are forcing upon them, they're summarily executed. The French Revolution (and by default The American Revolution) are bringing your freedom whether you want it or not!

From here, Buñuel's picture becomes increasingly absurdist, again dabbling in doses of surrealism as it plays out. A solider has too much to drinks, gets fresh with a female statue and is assulted by her husband, also a statue. A series of vignettes play out against the backdrop of what was, in 1974, modern France, introducing us to one set of characters after the next. Parents try to figure out how to find their missing daughter. Fetishes are exploited, quite gleefully at times, monks get lost in prayer only to be distracted by worldly affairs. A serial killer is let out of prison and enjoys his newfound celebrity status. Intellectual elites confuse toilets with feeding. Parents try to figure out how to find their missing daughter who hasn't gone missing at all.

With this very playful film, Buñuel manages to once again blend social commentary with artistically impressive visuals to create a film that is as entertaining as it is hell-bent on peeling back the layers of ridiculousness that are part of human existence. Like the earlier film, it is often very funny but sometimes that humor comes from an awkward place, we find ourselves laughing at some of this material simply because we don't know what else to do. Have no doubt that's intentional on the part of Buñuel, the man was very good at pushing buttons and poking holes in societal norms and there's quite a bit of that in this picture.

Like many of the man's films, there's a very dreamlike atmosphere to the proceedings. The vignettes run into one another in interesting ways, creating cohesion of sorts while avoiding anything even remotely close to a traditional narrative. Again, the visuals are strong and the cast do great work.

That Obscure Object Of Desire (1977):

The final film in the set and the director's filmography, 1977's That Obscure Object Of Desire follows a wealthy French man named Mathieu (Fernando Rey) who makes a point of living the good life. His lifestyle is affluent and he is accustomed to getting what he wants when he wants it. He is also an aging widower who doesn't seem to have much interest in the fairer sex.

When he becomes enthralled with gorgeous, and much younger, Conchita (Carole Bouquet/Angela Molina), a chambermaid in his employ, he approaches her expecting his advances to be reciprocated but it doesn't happen and the day after these events she resigns. Mathieu, however, is not accustomed to taking no for an answer and he continues to pursue Conchita, wooing her with expensive gifts knowing that she doesn't live nearly the lifestyle he does. Eventually, Conchita agrees to become Mathieu's mistress and he asks her to move in with him. After trying to buy her off and prove how serious he is to Conchita's mother, he has the two women evicted from their humble apartment.

From here, Mathieu and Conchita wind up meeting in different places and under different scenarios as Mathieu continues to push to get Conchita to finally go to bed with him.

Very much a tragicomedy, That Obscure Object Of Desire is, again, a biting satire of sorts that pulls no punches in its depictions of an out of touch member of the bourgeoisie class using his money and status in life to take advantage of someone on a lower rung of the class ladder. Incorporating interesting elements of surrealist and avante-garde filmmaking, this feature length battle of the sexes is based on Pierre 1898 novel La femme et le pantin (which translates to The Woman And The Puppet) and it sees the director (who passed away five years after completing this film) ending his career on a high note.

The acting is superb. Rey is, once again, perfect in the role. He plays Mathieu exactly as you feel he should be played and he's very convincing in his approach to the character. Conchita is played by two very different actresses, Carole Bouquet and Angela Molina, and they both bring a very different but equally effective approach to their work that makes them a joy to watch.

The Video:

Criterion touts these transfers are ‘new high-definition digital restorations of all three films' and while they look quite nice, for the most part, they are likely taken from the existing Studio Canal restorations that were done a few years ago (the Studio Canal logo preceding each of the features before they start is a bit of a giveaway here). Without those discs to compare this release to, it's impossible to say for sure, however. Regardless, if the images are a bit soft from time to time, they typically show strong detail even if it never feels like a reference quality picture. There's no noticeable print damage here at all, while grain is handled well, always looking natural. The AVC encoded 1080p presentations boast very good color reproduction and the 1.66.1 widescreen framing used on each one of the movies would appear to be the proper aspect ratios. Compression artifacts are never problematic and there are no issues with any obvious noise reduction or edge enhancement problems.

The Audio:

Audio options for all three films in this collection are handled by French language 24-bit LPCM Mono tracks, with optional subtitles offered up in English only. While range is understandably limited by the source material here, the quality of the audio itself is quite good, and true to the film's origins. Dialogue is clean, clear and easy to follow and the levels are nicely balanced during each of the three pictures. There are no problems with any hiss or distortion to complain about, and the subtitles are clean, clear and easy to read.

The Extras:

Extras are spread across the three discs as follows:

Disc One:

The extras for The Discreet Charm Of The Bourgeoisie begin with a fantastic hour-and-forty-minute feature length documentary from 2000 entitled Speaking Of Buñuel. This very thorough piece goes over his early home and family life before then covering how he got into film, early influences on his style, his time spent in the surrealist movement and his work on Un chien andalou, the films that came after that, the influence of the political climate on his work, his work done outside of Europe, the controversies that arose around him as he started to get more attention, his atheism and issues with religion, and lots, lots more. Throughout this piece we're treated to loads of clips and photos from his archives as well as interviews with those who knew and worked with the filmmaker. This is the best extra in the entire set and it's definitely worth checking out if you haven't seen it before.

The Castaway Of Providence Street is ‘a 1971 homage to Luis Buñuel made by his longtime friends and fellow filmmakers Arturo Ripstein and Rafael Castanedo' that runs for twenty-four-minutes in length. This is made up primarily of footage that the two men shot when they visited the directed at his then home in Mexico, it's quite interesting and a nice addition to the set.

Once Upon A Time: "The Discreet Charm Of The Bourgeoisie" is a 2011 television program about the making of the film that runs for fifty-two-minutes and is comprised of archival interviews with the director himself as well as many of the people who were in his circle at various points throughout his career. Also included on the disc is the fourteen-minute The Making Of The Discreet Charm Of The Bourgeoisie which is taken from a French television broadcast from 1972 covering the film in some detail.

Finishing up the extras on the first disc, we get the film's original theatrical trailer, menus and chapter selection options.

Disc Two:

The extras for The Phantom Of Liberty kick off with a five-minute video introduction by screenwriter Jean-Claude Carrière that gives an overview of the film and allows him to share his feelings on it. From there, we get the twenty-minute Analysis Of The Phantom Of Liberty featurette from 2017 by film scholar Peter William Evans. As the title suggests, this is a bit of a deep dive into the themes and ideas at play in the film, with a look at the techniques that Buñuel used, details of the script, some of the more unusual elements at play and more.

The five-minute Jean-Claude Brialy and Michel Piccoli piece is an archival interview where the two men discuss how and why they regard Buñuel as a master of cinema, how he was a bit of a ‘dangerous character,' what he was like to work with and more. Jean-Claude Brialy, which runs seven-minutes. This is a black and white television interview wherein Brialy covers working on the feature, how he got along with Buñuel (he describes working with him as a gift), how the director's age was a factor when they made the movie and how he was very dedicated to getting it finished.

The Producers is a thirty-one-minute piece that episode of a French television series, this episode focusing on Serge Silberman and his work with Buñuel (who actually kills him on screen in That Obscure Object Of Desire). He talks here about how he got into the film industry and worked his way up, working with Jean-Pierre Melville, how he got invovled with Buñuel who was in Mexico at the time, getting him back to Europe to work, coercing him into making more movies after Diary of A Chambermaid and more. Writer Jean-Claude Carrier also chimes in about what Buñuel was like to work with.

Outside of that we get the film's original theatrical trailer, menus and chapter selection options.

Disc Three:

The extras for That Obscure Object of Desire start with a nineteen-minute interview with Jean-Claude Carrière. Here the writer talks about how he came to work with Buñuel, how he was to collaborate with, how he got along with some of the different cast members and more. Also included on the disc are three excerpts from Jacques de Baroncelli's 1929 silent film La Femme et le Pantin which is an alternative adaptation of the source novel that Buñuel used as the basis for the picture. The excerpts are the three-minute Conchita Dances, the five-minute Humiliation and the four-minute Fight. These are interesting to see and you can get a feel, as you watch them, for how they might have influenced Buñuel's work.

Lady Doubles is a thirty-seven-minute 2017 documentary made up of interviews with actors Carole Bouquet and Ángela Molina, who played the role of Conchita in the feature. They talk about what it was like to work with Buñuel, how they got along on set, thoughts on his filmmaking methods and on the film itself. Portrait Of An Impatient Filmmaker is a sixteen-minute 2012 short documentary featuring director of photography Edmond Richard and assistant director Pierre Lary wherein the director's choice of replacing Maria Schneider after principal photography had begun and how this affected working on the picture.

The fifteen-minute Carrière, Ray, Silberman is a clip from a French television broadcast from 1977 that features Jean-Claude Carriere, Fernando Rey, and Serge Silberman discussing what it was like to work with the director on That Obscure Object Of Desire. The thirty-one-minute Remembering Buñuel featurette is a television broadcast from 1977 that contains interviews with Jean-Claude Carriere, Fernando Ray, Michel Piccoli, Muni, Julien Bertheau, Robert Benayoun, Serge Silberman, Claude Jaeger and publicist Georges Cravenne, all of whom worked with Buñuel in one capacity of another over the years and who are keen, in this piece, to share their respective memories of what that was like and of his importance to cinema.

Rounding out the extras on the third and final disc are a trailer for the feature, menus and chapter selection options.

Included in the set alongside the three discs is an insert booklet that contains essays on the filmmaker and his work by critic Adrian Martin and novelist and critic Gary Indiana, along with some archival interviews with Buñuel by critics José de la Colina and Tomás Pérez Turrent. Some technical notes on the presentation are in here as well, as are credits for the movies in the set as well as for the Blu-ray collection.

Overall:

The Criterion Collection Blu-ray release of Three Films By Luis Buñuel offers up three of the famed director's three final films, better known pictures from his filmography in many ways, in very nice shape and with a host of extras that detail the history of the films as well as the storied life of the man who made them. Highly recommended.

Ian lives in NYC with his wife where he writes for DVD Talk, runs Rock! Shock! Pop!. He likes NYC a lot, even if it is expensive and loud.