Fatal Obsession

I favor Buñuel for countless motivations. Not only his surrealistic politics and instant unfolding of storyline haunts me or the surface layers of sardonic satires taunts me a large, I adore his practice of symbols and signs. They are so implicit yet spectacular that a viewer always left with choices to delve much into the usage of the icons or not. Unlike Fellini or Tarkovsky, where these masters fashion an image “out of the world” to savor, for example, the usage of a man flying as a kite (in 8 ½ of Fellini) or the baffling representations of post-wars (in Mirror of Tarkovsky) Buñuel is always too unspoken and crafts lucid imagery of mundane objects to represent the dialects of his movies.

Well, “that obscure object of desire”, the last endeavor of Buñuel is also belongs to the same school of master filmmaking. His undying portraying of the puzzles of sexual politics and turbulence is the chief facet of the movie. Buñuel deposits a labyrinth of Mathieu’s (Fernando Rey) perplexities and desires with his relationship with Conchita (Carole Bouquet and Angela Molina). The affiliation is perennially thwarted by continuous break-ups and re-associations. Buñuel masterly created two countenances of Conchita as in two sides of the same coin. The protagonist Mathieu is deeply confused and threaten by abrupt, disordered and erratic behaviors of Conchita, the viewers are mystified as there are two actresses continuously interchanging the role of Conchita! With one Conchita we constantly see some kind of dilemmas and troublesome incidents, like terrorist activities, car bombing or explosions. In one word, continuous hazards from the outer world, but the hypnotized Mathieu does not noticed this that the world around him falling apart. The other Conchita is always having some clarifications of her inconsistent behaviors and there is some type of flavor of reconcilement. Both Conchita are used to convey different emotions, and the requirement of any Conchita is governed by the narration. This usage of two actresses for a leading role brings out the intricacy of Conchita, makes Mathieu so spellbound that he is unaware of the dissimilarity between these two women. He does not comprehend the character, so his all ammunitions of winning a woman (kindness, money, gift or even with brute force) fail miserably and his perceptions of captivating someone is confounded by her unremitting rejection and re-settlements.

Buñuel enthralls the audience by his sheer gripping of human psychology here. Mathieu is so desperately obsessed and gripped by Conchita, he trusts her completely and stands by her explanations of her behaviors, how mismatched or inconsistent they would be. Truly obsession sometimes misguide you, block your visions. That’s why Mathieu is ignorant of the fact that there are two appearances of Conchita (but there is one existence of her) alongside him in different shots, but he is so oblivious and obsessed understanding this is beyond him.

The final scene shows the reunited couple once more, standing behind the glass wall of a lace shop window, a woman is suing the lace of Conchita’s blood shed dress. Is the director sewing the scenes or their relation? But this testament is again spoiled by their silent arguing and a sudden bomb explosion.

This is a prime time evidence of sheer medley of imageries, surrealistic symbolism and deep commotions between sexual politics.

Cet obscur objet du désir
(That Obscure Object of Desire -1977)
Directed By: Luis Buñuel