Luis Buñuel

Viridiana

Viridiana

Banned in Francisco Franco’s Spain and denounced by the Vatican upon its premiere, Luis Buñuel’s irreverent vision of life as a beggar’s banquet is regarded by many as his masterpiece. In it, novice nun Viridiana (Silvia Pinal) does her utmost to maintain her Catholic principles, but her lecherous uncle (Fernando Rey) and a motley assemblage of paupers force her to confront the limits of her idealism. Winner of the Palme d’Or at the 1961 Cannes Film Festival, Viridiana is as audacious today as ever.

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Film Info

  • Spain
  • 1961
  • 90 minutes
  • Black & White
  • 1.66:1
  • Spanish
  • Spine #332

SPECIAL EDITION FEATURES

  • Restored high-definition digital transfer
  • Interviews with Silvia Pinal and author Richard Porton
  • Excerpts from a 1964 episode of Cinèastes de notre temps on Luis Buñuel's early career
  • U.S. release trailer
  • PLUS: An essay by Michael Wood

    Cover by Eric Skillman

Purchase Options

Collector's Sets

Collector's Set

Essential Art House: 50 Years of Janus Films

Essential Art House: 50 Years of Janus Films

DVD Box Set

50 Discs

$650.00

Out Of Print

SPECIAL EDITION FEATURES

  • Restored high-definition digital transfer
  • Interviews with Silvia Pinal and author Richard Porton
  • Excerpts from a 1964 episode of Cinèastes de notre temps on Luis Buñuel's early career
  • U.S. release trailer
  • PLUS: An essay by Michael Wood

    Cover by Eric Skillman
Viridiana
Cast
Silvia Pinal
Viridiana
Fernando Rey
Don Jaime
Francisco Rabal
Don Jorge
Margarita Lozano
Ramona
Victoria Zinny
Lucia
Teresita Rabal
Rita
Credits
Director
Luis Buñuel
Screenplay
Luis Buñuel
Screenplay
Julio Alejandro
Cinematography
José F. Aguayo
Editing
Pedro del Rey
Musical direction
Gustavo Pitaluga

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Luis Buñuel

Writer, Director

Luis Buñuel
Luis Buñuel

As made clear in his seminal works Viridiana and The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie—delirious screeds against, respectively, religion and social conformity—Luis Buñuel was one of cinema’s great subversives and mischief makers. He began his career as a member of the French surrealists—his first films, Un chien andalou and L’âge d’or, absurd and violently sexual scandals that met with censorship, were collaborations with Salvador Dalí. After years of working alternately in his native Spain (where the scintillating, shaming faux documentary Land Without Bread and, later, Viridiana were both banned), the United States, and Mexico, Buñuel made most of his late films in France, combining surrealist non sequiturs with attacks on the bourgeoisie, the church, and social hypocrisy in general in such masterpieces as The Milky Way, The Phantom of Liberty, and That Obscure Object of Desire.

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