Viridiana

UPC: 037429212622

Studio: Image Entertainment

Summary: After 25 years' exile, Luis Bu?uel was invited to his native Spain to direct Viridiana -- only to have the Spanish government suppress the film on the grounds of blasphemy and obscenity. Regarded by many as Bu?uel's crowning achievement, the film centers on an idealistic young nun named Viridiana (Silvia Pinal). Just before taking her final vows, Viridiana is forced by her mother superior to visit her wealthy uncle Don Jaime (Fernando Rey), who has "selflessly" provided for the girl over the years. She has always considered Don Jaime an unspeakable beast, so she is surprised when he graciously welcomes her into his home. Just as graciously, he sets about to corrupt Viridiana beyond redemption -- all because the girl resembles his late wife. It is always hard to select the most outrageous scene in any Bu?uel film; our candidate in Viridiana is the devastating Last Supper tableau consisting of beggars, thieves, and degenerates. As joltingly brilliant today as on its first release, Viridiana won the Golden Palm at the Cannes Film Festival. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Category: Comedy Drama

Awards: Palme d'Or – Cannes Film Festival

Features: New, restored high-definition Digital transfer
New video interviews with actress Silvia Pinal and author Richard Porton
Excerpts from a 1964 episode of Cin?astes de Notre Temps on Luis Bu?uel's early career
U.S. theatrical trailer
New and improved English subtitle translation
Plus: A booklet featuring Michael Wood and an interview with Bu?uel

Viridiana

Format: DVD

Release Date: 05/23/2006

Aspect Ratio: 1.66:1 Vistavision

Audio: DD1 Dolby Digital Mono

Runtime: 91 Minutes

Sides: 1

Number of Discs: 1

Language(s) Spanish

Subtitles: English

Region: USA & territories, Canada

Chapters: Disc #1 -- Virdiana
1. Logos/Opening Credits [1:56]
2. Uncle Don Jaime [3:56]
3. A Bed on the Floor [2:31]
4. "Just Pull Hard" [2:51]
5. Sleepwalker [3:08]
6. The Wedding Dress [7:29]
7. Rita Sees the Black Bull [5:00]
8. "So You Won't Forgive Me?" [6:42]
9. "Something Terrible Has Happened" [2:59]
10. Mother Superior [3:09]
11. New Residents [5:12]
12. Two Meals [6:09]
13. Don Jorge and Viridiana [2:02]
14. Out on the Land [7:20]
15. "So You Do Like Her" [7:27]
16. The Last Supper [8:49]
17. Hallelujah Chorus [6:35]
18. "Kill Him!" [3:13]
19. Shuffling the Deck [4:31]
20. Color Bars [:00]

Mark Deming

One wonders just what Francisco Franco and the leaders of his regime were thinking when they invited arch surrealist and stubborn anti-Fascist Luis Bu?uel back to the land of his birth to make Viridiana. Bu?uel had made a career out of confronting his audiences and defying creative authority, and anyone who imagined that he had meekly begun sleeping with the enemy was in for a shock. Viridiana was a gleefully blasphemous tirade against Catholicism and the Spanish bourgeoisie that proved something of an embarrassment to Spain despite winning top honors at the 1961 Cannes Film Festival. Fernando Rey, one of Bu?uel's favorite actors in his late period, is deliciously sleazy yet refined as Don Jaime; Rey's easy charm and understated wit are the perfect match for the elegantly corrupt man whose sense of propriety does not rule out drugging and seducing his niece, who happens to be a nun. Silvia Pinal's performance as Viridiana often suggests that she isn't entirely in on the joke, but the distance works in her favor, as the young novitiate seems blissfully unaware first of her uncle's designs upon her, and later of the contempt that the beggars and street people she tries to help feel for her. The final scene -- in which the beggars freeze into a recreation of The Last Supper as a filthy woman "photographs" them by lifting her skirts -- is, along with Simon of the Desert, one of Bu?uel's strongest and funniest anti-clerical moments. Like the best of Bu?uel's work, Viridiana is smart, witty, deeply cutting, and thoroughly uncompromised, a fitting bit of revenge from an old Loyalist against the dictator who defeated him. Bu?uel would have the last laugh yet again when he returned to Spain nine years later to make Tristana, a fitting companion piece to Viridiana. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi

Cast and Crew: Luis Heredia  Actor 
Lola Gaos  Actor 
Joaquin Roa  Actor 
Alicia Jorge Barriga  Actor 
Joaquin Mayol  Actor 
Milagros Tomas  Actor 
Jose Manuel Martin  Actor 
Juan Garcia Tienda  Actor 
José Calvo  Actor 
Sergio Mendizabal  Actor 
Maruda Isabert  Actor 
Palmira Guerra  Actor 
Luis Buñuel  Director 
Luis Buñuel  Screenwriter 
Juan Buñuel  Screenwriter 
Julio Alejandro  Screenwriter 
Ricardo Munoz Suay  Producer 
Silvia Pinal  Actor 
Fernando Rey  Actor 
Francisco Rabal  Actor 
Margarita Lozano  Actor 
Victoria Zinny  Actor 
Teresa Rabal  Actor 

Country: Mexico,Spain