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I wanted to but couldn't!

Good story, Not enough for a whole film

The film never slows down or bores, plunging from one harrowing sequence to the next.

All of these films share one commonality, that being a kind of emotional center that humanizes a cast of monsters.

By the end of "Viridiana", the viewer has experienced an explosion of unique and original cinema. This often banned, highly controversial film is perhaps the finest work within famous surrealist Luis Bunuel's prolific filmography, joining the ranks of such masterpieces as "Un chien andalou" and "The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie". It is a film split into two distinct halves; the first half focuses on the nun Viridiana's brief visit to her sick uncle's mansion in which she has a strange, demented encounter with the man after he suggests something taboo and, frankly, perverted. The situation escalates, leading to the second half in which Viridiana is left scarred and desperately seeks redemption by caring for a group of impoverished men and women, each of whom has their own quirks and flaws as well as a fine taste for mischief and, in the end, absolute chaos.The first half succeeds in terms of tragic, disturbing drama, while the second takes a much more comical approach while still remaining quite dark and chilling in tone. The end result is a fusion of comedy and drama that is as haunting, unique, weird, and awkward as any film in the history of world cinema. There are no heroes or villains in Bunuel's world, only characters, each with their own ups and downs, and the cast of characters showcased in "Viridiana" serves as strong evidence for that claim. The title character (played with all of the necessary charm and melancholy needed by the lovely Silvia Pinal) is both an occasionally foolish pawn for Bunuel's religious satire as well as an empathetic and kindhearted woman who only wants to do good, but, unfortunately, is doomed to much failure. The poverty stricken individuals she seeks to support are fueled by entertaining and hilarious personalities; their banter is witty and their actions are often shocking, and I could not help but love them, and LOVE watching them (especially when they acted out in the most outrageous ways possible)! Bunuel is a genius when it comes to, among many other things, challenging his audience's morals; he pokes the viewer with a mischievous stick that dares them to laugh along with the sickest plots imaginable and to enjoy the zany presence of some of his most immoral characters. Various scenes from "Viridiana" surpass most other movies in terms of humor, magic, and flat-out quality. One sequence is made historical due mainly to its unique editing, as Bunuel's lens captures a prayer conducted by Viridiana and the impoverished jesters she seeks to save that is contrasted with the hard workers surrounding them. Bunuel cuts from prayer to labor in a way that fills my stomach with butterflies and my mind with awe; it is a tongue and cheek, meaningful little sequence that is further enhanced by its unbeatable technical mastery as brilliant editing, sound design/mixing, and camera movement/placement. That one scene alone should serve as an urgent enough recommendation for any film lover to immediately seek out and watch this brilliant, blasphemous, tragic, and hilarious epic of a film.

the clash between different worlds. and the try to have a common language. a critic against Church. and the special beauty of Silvia Pinal. love. and obsessions. fear and the need to self definition. nothing new at the first sigh from Bunuel. but Viridiana is a return to the origins. so Spanish than it becomes universal. bitter and harsh tender. a masterpiece because it is more the film of nuances than the result of a story. a delicate embroidery of lost beauty and about the shadows as cage of idealism. and for that Viridiana remains seductive - for the grace to present an ugly universe in each of its levels. and to propose a sort of cold view about the ordinary choices of innocence.

Luis Buñuel is one of those directors I really want to love. Los Olvidados was a winner for me but Exterminating Angel, Discreet Charm, Belle de Jour and now Viridiana are films I consider good but not great. Perhaps their meanings just fly over my head. There's no doubt that Viridiana has Buñuel's finest cinematography. With its deep whites and blacks and brilliant framing, it's one of the finest shot films of the 60s at the very least. But there's something about the story that doesn't sit with me right. I just don't know what Buñuel is trying to say with his stories. The plot progresses and it's interesting watching this character be tested throughout these obstacles and it never feels like it's trying to say something that isn't cryptic. Is it about morality? Class comparison? Religion? I don't mind when films don't spell it out for me but when a film like Viridiana is so exquisitely shot and acted, it's quite unsatisfying and a little frustrating to not get anything out of it. Maybe it does touch those who love it in a way that I just don't relate to at all to even recognize. Still, very good on the surface.7/10

Sorry Buñuel fans, I know comparisons are odious but if I had to pick the definitive Maestro between him and Fellini, I'd say Fellini without a doubt. And Viridiana gives me the best arguments. Let's face it: this is a dated movie, hardly a classic. The raw value of a classic is above all its resilience to time and V. doesn't do well through that test; even more considering that its lasting value comes from that "slap in the face to Franco" and from a rather gratuitous blasphemy scene. Also, the movie is not the fruit of an unique stroke of creative genius, but instead a work with sources of inspiration in two traditional Hispano American cultural creatures.Most Buñuel reviewers fail to recognize where he gets his real sources and influences. For ex. they say of Phantasm that it got no structure, when the fact it has one, that of a "novela picaresca", a genre born in Spain in 1554. The protagonist of the N.P. is usually a man born in the lowest strata of society--gen. an orphan--who grew up having to endure numerous hardships under the yoke of cruel, miserable masters, including assorted clerics and blind men. Structurally a NP is a sequence of short, unrelated, stories, their only common link being the "picaro", its protagonist. About Phantasm, Buñuel himself said once that his initial idea was to use one single character as the link, so I'll rest my case there. You can do further research, but let's just say the mood of a NP is usually ugly, one of utter disenchantment, even if the picaro tries to keep a brave face when telling his story--because he's also the narrator—spicing it up with dark humor. (For ex. in Lazarillo de Tormes the essential NP, the way he got rid of his blind master--he says--was to put the man in front of a post, telling him there was an irrigation ditch in the way, so he had to jump as far as he could—-so you can see there the traditional inspiration for the ugliness and cruelty of the beggars here). The other traditional source which inspires the first part of the movie, is Hispano American melodrama, mostly Mexican and Spanish.Contrary to North American melodrama, which focuses on intrigue, plot twists, clash of personalities, Iberoamerican melodrama is corny, sappy and it focuses mainly in getting the waterworks going. One plot line that was used and abused for decades was for ex. that of the poor woman who gives birth to and illegitimate child, who is then taken away and given in adoption to a rich family. Decades later the still poor woman goes to work as a maid in a wealthy household and guess what...You got it, the master of the house is her lost son. So when the last episode comes out, their coming together, there's no one single handkerchief to be found in the whole city.The main character here comes right out of Hispanic melodrama; that's why I don't like it, specially when Pinal overdoes the virginal vestal. It is as if once given her marching orders she would have switched herself to make for the sappiest soap opera heroine. Come on, I've known girls like that but never one like her. In real life they usually lose that innocence as soon as they step out of the convent. Viridiana is unrealistic, a caricature; no wonder the movie seems to become real only once the beggars are left alone. It would have been better if Buñuel had thought of her as just another down to earth character, but it seems he was bent on keeping her above the crowd as some kind of a metaphor. Of a Spain torn between its traditional forces maybe--the Church and a decaying land aristocracy--but I fail to see there in what Arrabal's Jorge can be compared to Franco. Franco wasn't a urban liberal at all but an ultra conservative, uber traditionalist, dictator and war criminal. That's also why, returning to Viridiana, I prefer actresses from outside doing Hispanic heroines when it comes to melodrama. Hispanic actresses can be good at comedy, satire--as Pinal certainly is in Simon and Exterminating Angel-but when it comes to melodrama they seem genetically programmed to ham it up, to tune themselves to get the audience's waterworks going full blast, or else they may think they have failed.So, while Fellini was instrumental in giving birth to a new film genre, Italian neo-realism and then went to create his own universe--Fellinesque we call it--where the characters born of his own fruitful imagination, memories, could evolve at ease, there's no such equivalent in Buñuel's work. Buñuel got propelled into surrealism in his association with Dali, of course, but he is more apt at showing his philosophy of life—his disenchantment with mankind and its pathetic attempts to reach the transcendental, its habit of debasing everything it touches; his own amazement at the weirdness of the situations we find ourselves many times in life--and also at bringing memories and dreams to the screen, he was more apt at that than at creating a new universe where his own characters could live and evolve--as Kafka did in literature and Fellini in movies. That's why many Fellinis are timeless, I could watch them many times over, while quite a few Buñuels are already irremediably dated, as Viridiana. I say 6.5/10, of interest mostly for film students and Buñuel fans.