Laserdisc Title: "THAT OBSCURE OBJECT OF DESIRE (1977)"
Edition: The Criterion Collection (Single Disc)
Directed By: Luis Bunuel
Starring: Fernando Rey, Carole Bouquet & Angela Molina, Julian Berthau, Andre Weber, Milena Vukotik, Maria Asquerino, Pieral
Special Features: ---see footnotes below for more information---
Production / Year: 1977 Greenwich Film Productions
Running Time: 103 Minutes / Color
Audio Format: Digital Sound, CX Encoded
Video Format: Videoscope, NTSC, CLV (Extended Play)
Miscellaneous Features: In French with English subtitles
Distributed By: The Voyager Company (First Printing 1990)
Catalog / Spine Number: CC1223L (Spine Number 113)

IMPORTANT: This is a 12-inch Diameter Laserdisc, which is NOT the same as DVD and cannot be played on a DVD player!

Cosmetic Condition:
Disc (s): Very Good - Few very light to very minor hairline surface swirls or very light fingerprint marks
Jacket: Very Good - Normal shelf wear, few creases, light scuffs, slightly worn-out corners or edges but no signs of spines splitting

Synopsis:

Luis Buñuel's final film explodes with eroticism, bringing full circle the director's lifelong preoccupation with the darker side of desire. Buñuel regular Fernando Rey plays Mathieu, an urbane widower, tortured by his lust for the elusive Conchita. With subversive flare, Buñuel uses two different actresses in the lead- Carole Bouquet, a sophisticated French beauty, and Angela Molina, a Spanish coquette. Drawn from Pierre Louÿs' 1898 novel, "La Femme et le Pantin," That Obscure Object of Desire is a dizzying game of sexual politics punctuated by a terror that harkens back to Buñuel's brilliant surrealistic beginnings.

Nobody makes films like Luis Bunuel. In this, his last film, he captures the related themes of obsessive desire, frustration, and immaturity perfectly, crafting a wicked black comedy. When a wealthy middle-aged man, played to perfection by Fernando Rey, is entranced by a young girl he has recently hired as one of the maids in his grand mansion, he pursues her obsessively.

The girl is played by two different actresses; here Bunuel is slyly saying to the audience, This man is too (two) distracted, too (two) obsessed. The girl alternately leads him on and crushes his hopes, time after time, yet still the man returns to be alternately entranced and crushed. His actions are ultimately revealed to be far too immature--if nothing else, based on the behavior of the girl--for his age, but he can't help himself. Simultaneously, a guerilla group plants bombs and blows things up all over the city of Paris where the film is set. The immature need for immediate results, intensified by repeated frustration--typified by both the guerillas and the desperate man--is nowhere revealed in film as dramatically as in That Obscure Object of Desire. The film ends with the convergence of these two entities (the guerillas and the man) in a perfect climax.

The "message"? Not only that you can't always get what you want; more to the point, here is what people do all over the world: want things they don't understand, fail to understand what they want. Highly recommended. Bunuel is like no other director, ever, and this film is without question one of his best.

SPECIAL FEATURES

The original theatrical trailer is presented on Side 2 after the completion of the film.

Videoscope: The Criterion Collection is proud to present That Obscure Object of Desire in its original wide-screen format.

THIS IS NOT A DVD!!! THIS IS A 12" LASERDISC AND WILL NOT PLAY IN A DVD PLAYER

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