Posts from the ‘1929’ Category

Un Chien Andalou

I’ve decided to start including reviews for short films here, as there is a wealth of great stuff out there to examine. It should come as no surprise, therefore, that Un Chien Andalou is the first short film that I’ll be looking at. Anyone with any interest in cinema as an art form has likely seen or at the least heard of Un Chien Andalou. It is arguably one of the most influential short pieces in early cinema and certainly breaks a lot of boundaries with its bold style and incredible content. I had to keep reminding myself that the film was from 1929.

Un Chien Andalou comes to us from Spanish director Luis Bunuel. This would be Bunuel’s first work and would begin a long career of filmmaking in which he would direct 32 films. Bunuel wrote 39 films. His final directed film was 1977′s That Obscure Object of Desire, an erotic film about obsession. Bunuel work largely relies on the surreal and there is perhaps no finer example of surrealist cinema than Un Chien Andalou. Dreams were what fed Bunuel’s imagination, as his early films as a surrealist in Paris and his later films from the late 1970s would evidence. He was never concerned with traditional conventions in terms of filmmaking, but rather almost went out of his way to confuse and bewilder the audience.

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