Castle in the Sky (1986)

Keeping in line with the Miyazaki, I checked out Castle in the Sky. A very good film, albeit kind of shallow. I mean, I would have preferred something with a little more depth and substance in terms of plot and character, like Mononoke. But, Castle in the Sky was still very good. Another grand, inventive adventure from Miyazaki. Pure escapism.

The Phantom of Liberty (1974)

Ah, late-career French Bunuel. Phantom of Liberty once again proves that Bunuel lost some steam in his later years. Granted, it's still a very good film, but it can't hold a candle to his earlier Spanish flicks.

By biggest complaint with the film is its episodic nature. It feels more like a loose series of vignettes than a fully-developed story. I don't mind it if there's something tying them all together, but Phantom of Liberty seems to lack narrative focus, which really distracts from the film. It's almost like Bunuel had a bunch of different ideas and tossed them all together in a film.

Still, it's a good film nonetheless. Some of the stuff was downright hilarious. The toilet scene, of course, classic. Also, there are many small touches that made me chuckle far more often than the outright gags, mostly due to the dry nature that Bunuel gives them. When the 'Police Commissioner' walks in on his Sister playing piano nude, he simply walks around her, seemingly not noticing. It lends the film a very dreamlike quality insofar as the people seem to accept these bizarre events as completely normal and banal.

I really can't see what ties each of the parts to liberty, personally, but I've been proven to be bad with interpreting Bunuel's stuff. The 'pornographic' photos, is it meant to say that lovely architecture and beautiful scenery is disgusting to the bourgeoisie? The painting of the execution being present quite a few times during the film, is it meant to say something of authority? And the greet speech on laws and morals given by the man in the police station, but constantly interrupted, is it meant to symbolize society as a whole, that we can't even learn basic fundamentals before we're constantly interrupted by the bustle of everyday life? Or, is it Bunuel, seemingly interrupted by the bizarre actions of the characters in this film, as if he has no control over them? Still, he makes the most sense of anyone in the film by stating that different countries have different sets of morals and ethics. He says, "Everyone is someone else's barbarian."

It doesn't seem as much like an attack, as some other Bunuel films, on society. It seems to me, to be more like a breaking down of social conventions, by pointing out the absurdities of everyday life by exaggerating them. A very good film, but just not great.

Edit: Still a day after and I'm chuckling over The Phantom of Liberty. A much better essay can be found here.