A group of six upper class bourgeois are constantly meeting for lunch or dinner but having their meals interrupted due to bizarre circumstances. The Theatre Of The Absurd is well known because of such playwrights as Eugene Ionesco, Samuel Beckett and Jean Genet among others. But has anyone ever coined the phrase, the Cinema Of The Absurd? If they did, surely its leading proponent would be Luis Bunuel. His delirious
DISCREET CHARM OF THE BOURGEOISIE is my favorite Bunuel film. Bunuel's surreal film has priests working for wealthy people as gardeners for free, strangers walking up to tables in restaurants to recite their dreams, guests invited to dinner who find themselves characters in a play and Bunuel's repeated image of the film's protagonists walking down a country road with no idea where they're going. The film itself is ripe for various interpretations and I'm not sure that Bunuel wasn't just simply tugging at our legs. Whatever the motivations, the film is a joy! The excellent cast consists of Fernando Rey, Stephane Audran, Delphine Seyrig, Jean Pierre Cassel, Bulle Ogier, Paul Frankeur and Julian Bertheau.
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