Un Chien Andalou (1929), a call to murder.

One way to describe Un Chien Andalou is that it is a Freudian fever dream and like Freud, it’s obsessed with sex and groping women (Crews 2017). This review will look at the film through Bordwell, Thompson and Smith’s (2017:61) evaluation criteria: Coherence, Intensity of effect, Complexity and Originality.

But first the plot:

Un Chien Andalou begins with a man sharpening a straight razor that leads to one of film’s iconic shot: a woman’s eye being cut open, setting the scene for the rest of the film which is men’s sadomasochistic tendencies towards woman (Stent 2014) and leads into a narrative about a man who with all his might tries to fight (symbolically and literary) the societal rules that hold him back as he attempts to rape a woman.

Coherence:

The film is all over the place giving it that surrealist dreamlike quality, aimed to “replicate their (dreams) very processes through illogical, irrational disruptions and disturbing imagery, uncensored by normal wakeful consciousness or morality” (The Art Story 2022). The editing does follow a chronological “narrative”, but there is discontinuity (i.e. the androgynous woman in the street). Although this could be part of the dream quality mentioned above. The scene blocking is excellent, i.e. where there are two characters that is played by the same person. These scenes do a good job at hiding the body double.

Intensity of effect:

According to Dali, the film’s intent is “To disrupt the mental anxiety of the spectator” (Koller 2001). Which is achieved, with the first shot that compares the eeriness of a cloud floating past the moon to a blade cutting into an eyeball. The other shots achieve the same effect. Whether it is a dead donkey being dragged in a piano or ants coming out of a hand, every shot manages to shock and confuse the viewer throughout, while keeping their attention.

Complexity:

There are many films that try to be complex and none do it better than Un Chien Andalou. With its many symbols of hands alluding to the idea that they can bring “intense pleasure and intolerable pain” (Stent 2014). The film presents these symbols in a manner that forces the viewer to consider and then reconsider each shot.

Originality:

Seeing that the Surrealist movement is a niche market with many films left unfinished (Loter 1995), there is nothing like this film. Not today or even the 1920s, because Un Chien Andalou was an alternative to Hollywood (Brodwell, Thompson & Smith 2017:466), which dominated the market with “swashbucklers, historical extravaganzas, and melodramas” (Dirks 2020).

Conclusion:

Un Chien Andalou is by no means a great film, but it is a good one. The reason being that, as Reading at Recess points out, the film can be a bit frustrating, due to its lack of a clear storyline, that it is just sixteen minutes of disconnected pictures. But it is still good because it still manages to do what it intended to, which is to: “To create a scandal among audiences and to shock, disturb and startle them” (Matthew 2015).  


List of sources:

Bordwell, D, Thompson, K & Smith, J. 2017. Film Art: An Introduction. 11th Edition. New York: McGraw-Hill Education.

Crew, F. 2017. Was Sigmund Freud really just a sex-mad old fraud? The founder of psychoanalysis was a money-obsessed cocaine addict who groped women patients and had a genius for self-promotion. https://www.dailymail.co.uk/home/books/article-5044817/Was-Freud-really-just-sex-mad-old-fraud.html (Accessed on 7 March 2022).

Dirks, T. 2020. 1920s Film History. https://www.filmsite.org/20sintro.html (Accessed on 9 March 2022).

Koller, M. 2001. Un Chien Andalou. https://www.sensesofcinema.com/2001/cteq/chien/ (Accessed on 8 March 2022).

Loter, J. 1995. The Inspired and the Inspiring: The Surrealists’ Cinematic Contemplation and Aesthetic. https://www.jimloter.com/essays/surrealism.html (Accessed on 8 March 2022).

Matthew. 2015. UnChien Andalou. http://www.classicartfilms.com/un-chien-andalou-1929 (Accessed on 9 March 2022).

Stent, S. 2014. Surrealism, symbols and sexuality in Un Chien Andalou (1929) and L’age D’or (1930). https://silentlondon.co.uk/2014/03/14/surrealism-hands-and-sexuality-in-un-chien-andalou-1929-and-lage-dor-1930/ (Accessed on 7 March 2022).

The Art Story. 2022. Surrealist Film. https://www.theartstory.org/movement/surrealist-film/ (Accessed on 7 March 2022).


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