Retrospective Film Review

Un Chien Andalou (1929) • 95 Years Later — the shocking surrealism of a nightmarish subconscious

Luis Buñuel and Salvador Dalí present 16 minutes of bizarre, surreal imagery.

Surrealist cinema has never been quite the same since Un Chien Andalou. Luis Buñuel and Salvador Dalí’s shocking, disorientating film was so evocative and artistically intriguing that it was immediately acclaimed as a work of genius. 95 years on, one can still see shades of brilliance, even if it’s not quite as shocking as it once was.

When reviewing a film, I usually provide a plot summary to familiarise the reader with the story. However, that’s simply impossible here. There is no story (or at least not a comprehensible one), and the entire 16-minute short is a collage of suggestive imagery. Some of it is scandalous, some parts are amusing, but it’s always bizarre — which is precisely what the young filmmakers intended.

Contrary to popular belief, Un Chien Andalou was not the first surrealist film, although it may well be the best-known. André Breton, widely considered…