THE CRIMINAL LIFE OF ARCHIBALDO DE LA CRUZ Movie Review

Ensayo de un Crimen
Rehearsal for a Crime

While it's generally acknowledged that this 1955 Mexican film by Luis Buñuel never fully measures up to its underlying premise, that premise itself may be as hilariously, perversely “Buñuelian” as anything the great surrealist ever conjured (and may be so ingenious as to have been impossible to live up to). A young boy is intruded upon by his governess at the very moment he happens to be trying on his mother's clothes. His embarrassment at her scolding is short-lived, because in addition to the (revolutionary?) act of cross-dressing, another, bloodier revolution is taking place in the streets outside his home. That revolt converges with little Archibaldo's, producing a stray—or divinely aimed—shot that shuts the governess up by killing her, instantly transforming little Archibaldo's guilt and shame into gratified and enormously relieved sexual pleasure. Alas, the powerful and thoroughly ingrained fetish that has been created in Archibaldo at that moment proves a difficult and unwieldy one for him to recreate later in life—though not for lack of trying. This theme of the unendingly frustrated quest for genuine sexual fulfillment would go on to become the spine of many of Buñuel's later masterworks, including Tristana, Belle de Jour, and The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie.

NEXT STOP … The Exterminating Angel, Viridiana, That Obscure Object of Desire

1955 95m/B MX SP Ernesto Alonso, Ariadne Welter, Rita Macedo, Rodolfo Landa, Andrea Palma, Miroslava Stern; D: Luis Bunuel; W: Luis Bunuel; C: Augustin Jimenez; M: Jorge Perez. VHS FCT, WBF