Over the past weekend at Bill’s blog, there was a great post about Viridiana, and a fascinating discussion in the comments section by some folks with real knowledge about the life and work of the legendary Luis Buñuel, that film’s director. While all that was going on, I was catching up with The Milky Way, which may be his most complex film, at least structurally, and one of his more obtuse as well. While I’m just a Buñuel piker, having seen just a few of his films, I offer a few observations along the way of getting my head around this remarkable flick.
It’s structured as a pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela, along the Way of Saint James. According to Roman Catholic tradition, Santiago de Compostela is the burial place of James, who is regarded as the brother of Christ. It has been a pilgrimage route for over a thousand years.
The Milky Way follows Pierre and Jean (Paul Frankeur and Laurent Terzieff) as they head along the Way. It is not clear exactly why they are making the pilgrimage, except perhaps to cadge off of whoever they meet, and engage in a little petty thievery. They are vagabonds, rascals in the classic tradition of the great picaresque novels (picaro means “rogue” in Spanish), and the film has that overall structure, as our (anti)heroes encounter a succession of (mis)adventures along the way. On a deserted road appears a man (Alain Cuny) who enacts a saying of Christ (“to those who have, more will be given …”) and repeats the call of the Hebrew prophet Hosea, straight out of the Hebrew and Christian Bibles: “marry a wife of prostitution and have children of prostitution.”
And so, the very first encounter sets the tone: the journey is to be a mystical one, which we’re not necessarily supposed to “get,” at least right off the bat. It raises questions that are not fully answered, even over the course of the film: are we to regard Pierre and Jean, like Hosea, as prophets of some sort? If they are, what is their message? Or are they merely observers, stand-ins for all of us as we observe the strange world Buñuel has concocted?
That first scene tells us another thing as well: the film will be full of Christian reference, some obvious — like the enactment of the Christ quote — and some not so much. And indeed, it is rife with theology and debate over matters of historical importance to the Roman Catholic Church, in which Buñuel was raised. In an early scene, a priest debates the difference between transubstantiation and consubstantiation with a skeptical police officer; after the priest changes his position in mid-conversation (from the former to the heretical latter), he’s picked up by the men in white jackets. Turns out he’s an escapee.
And that summarizes one of Buñuel’s themes in The Milky Way: that the arguing over fine points in theology and/or doctrine as if one can be certain of them is insane, and he indicts the entire church in this. A common thread running through the film is debate — usually in pairs, but sometimes within just one person, as in the priest — over doctrinal positions within the Church. Two of the most prominent are Priscillianism (a variant of Gnosticism) and Jansenism (a Calvinist heresy that rose within the Church after the Reformation). Buñuel attacks the absurdity of treating these opinions as objective, verifiable facts, and taking them so seriously that one is willing to die for them.
Throughout the film, people constantly argue over doctrinal positions, all of which represent historically significant disputes within the church. They argue at sword-point, at gun-point and over pints in the local pub. the fight literally and figuratively, killing one another over their differing interpretation of the Christian faith. Our heroes are wondering observers (all but one time, when they are “infected” by a dispute and begin arguing); they function as our stand-ins, as Buñuel’s incredulous eyes and ears.
Overlain upon the picaresque structure are multiple episodes from multiple times, some sequential, some side by side, and some intermingled. Historical figures, like the Marquis de Sade (Michel Piccoli) intone their philosophical positions; a restaurant owner argues the niceties of the divinity of Christ as debated at the First Nicaen Council. At one point, our protagonists are invited to a wooded ceremony from another age. They don’t go, but we do, and witness an ancient Priscillian ceremony involving the installation of a rival pope. Later, they are replaced by two men from the middle ages — who ask them to hold their donkey — who, in turn, witness the digging up of the Priscillian Pope’s body, which is burnt for heresy even though already dead. As they leave the scene, the substitute rogues shout anti-Trinitarian slogans.
Key among the time-warped episodes are those showing Jesus, living out some of the scenes from the New Testament. In them, he seems positively sane beside some of his later followers of the faith, embodying another of Buñuel’s themes: look at the complicated, ridiculous mess Jesus’ followers hath wrought.
In the end, reducing The Milky Way to a series of themes and ideas does it a disservice, similar to the one done by reducing its author to an angry atheist, as is very often done by critics. Like Buñuel, the film is tremendously complex and ambiguous. It overflows with overtones of mysticism and conflicting sentiments and images about the Roman Catholic Church. Watching it can be a confounding experience; it may be one of the only commercial films that seminary training helps one to understand. Having had that training, I can honestly say that while I understand the doctrinal niceties well, I am still mystified by the more subtle shadings of Buñuel’s intentions. All I can do is watch it again (and probably again), and recommend this most entertaining and enjoyable film to anyone who likes their cinema challenging and not immediately transparent.
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I almost chose this as my next Bunuel, before succumbing to Marilyn and choosing That Obscure Object of Desire. I now sort of wish I’d stuck to my guns, but you’re write-up ensures that The Milky Way will be next on the list.
This review of Bunuel’s THE MILKY WAY by Rick Olson is one of the most superlative pieces of scholarly film criticism I have ever read at ANY site. You deserve to be paid big money for this, and I am dead serious. Your theological and doctrinal examinations here are brilliant. I also love the film and the director, and I had a feeling you would be getting to him soon. I also await Marilyn’s reaction. I would have more to say but I’m at school and reading slowly through it spent my time for now.
Congratulations sir, I hope many others come here.
Rick -
Wow, great review. I actually had never heard of this one, but my Bunuel knoweldge is a little spotty. (I believe I’ve seen just three of his films.) This sounds like a film I would watch and then endlessly analyze and try to understand, but I don’t have anything like your depth of theological undestanding, so I’d probably miss the whole point. I’m glad I read this before I got around to actually seeing “The Milky Way,” and I think I’ll probably be adding to my Netflix queue soon.
Bill,
I like this film better than “That Obscure Object of Desire,” which I saw as well over the weekend. I’m not sure why, actually, other than perhaps it is less obscure …
Sam, thanks for the praise. I appreciate it a lot. And I could use a little extra change . . .
Pat, so is my Bunuel knowledge. I am really looking forward to exploring more of his films. Marilyn Ferdinand is the real Bunuel expert around these parts.
I think it would be more mystifying if you don’t know the doctrinal ins and outs, but perhaps that would be more to Bunuel’s intention. After all, most folks have never had a theology course or a course in church history. I actually kind of wish I could see it without the prior knowledge to gauge its impact.
Simon of the Desert will be a good follow up to this when it comes out next Feb. I like how you point out the misguided “angry atheist” label often put on Bunuel. Bunuel would hate that too. The thing I love about him as social critic is that he was never so self-righteous to put himself above it. He wouldn’t discriminate by class. He went after the upper crust and the low-down. An equal opportunity offender, yes sir! I also see a dark humor in it more than a smugness we see from some modern filmmakers.
Have you see The Phantom of LIberty? I find it to be one his most enjoyably complex movie. I love watching it, and pretty much take a different angle each time I see it. It feels breezy to me, which is an odd term to use for a Bunuel movie, but…
It will surprise you all to know that I have not gotten my hands on The Milky Way. Rick has done a superb job of descirbing the film and giving shading to his interpretations. I have shied away from The Milky Way for precisely the reason Rick gives–my theological knowledge (though I studied primitive Christianity in college long, long ago) never seemed up to the task. Perhaps my hesitation was misplaced, since the film obviously considers theological argument to be a strangely pointless exercise. But I do not think it is. I’m not religious and don’t believe in God, but I do think that religious sentiment reveals a lot about human character and therefore is worth discussing. Among his religion-oriented films, I especially like Nazarin, which heaps tremendous scorn on a holy man by showing the destruction that comes in his wake.
What I like so much about That Obscure Object of Desire is that it is the culmination of all of Bunuel’s work. It takes in everything he’s had in other films as an ultimate artistic statement. Sorry if I led you astray, Bill, but that’s my take on it.
Fox, these are nice observations . . . I think you can see his self-commentary most clearly in the films with Fernando Rey as his doppelganger . . . The Obscure Object of Desire, Viridiana, Discreet Charm. There is a certain perversity to Rey in these films, usually just below the surface, but coloring his performances nonetheless. I’ll never forget Viridiana, the first Bunuel I saw, when just by the scene set-ups and Rey’s marvelously subtle acting we suspect an unhealthy relationship between Viridiana’s uncle and a little girl.
I too am really looking forward to Simon of the Desert.
“He went after the upper crust and the low-down”
Quite right! If you have seen “Viridiana” or “Los Olvidados” it is quite obvious that Buñuel wasn’t biased, as far as human miseries were concerned, he found them in both the rich and the poor.
BTW, Rick, I haven’t still seen “The Milky Way”, so your review really makes look forward to see it!
Marilyn, I think that The Milky Way was made to be seen by folks without theological training. And I think, of the Bunuels I’ve seen, it’s the most ambiguous in Bunuel’s view of spirituality. As Jonathan observed over on that thread at Bill’s, he seems often to critique organized religion (as in the structures humans have created to approach the ineffable) rather than spirituality itself.
I think The Milky Way is a fine example of that. It’s tremendously complex, and I didn’t even scratch the surface of what’s under it’s hood. Not that I get all of it, you understand. But by the way he structures it, he seems to admit of the possiblity of the existence of the supernatural, or whatever you want to call it.
I look forward to seeing Nazarin some day.
Gloria, I’m glad you liked the review. Good point about his finding idiocies in the poor and the rich alike, as the “bum’s last supper” scene of Viridiana (which Altman and others have shamelessly ripped off) illustrates.