Un Chien Andalou and L'Age d'Or Comparison Essay - narrative and psychology

How and why do the narratives of both experimental surrealist films you have studied withhold psychological insight into character? Analyse specific examples from both films. [35]

-Un Chien Andalou and L'Age d'Or 

Luis Bunuel in both Un Chien Andalou and L'Age d'Or creates narrative ambiguity through the lack of a conventional Todorovian structure, the disruptive and illogical chronology through editing and performance exploring thematic ideas in each film rather than traditional storytelling. This narrative approach withholds psychological insight into character, with the surrealist intention to be an exploration of the unconscious mind as supported by Sigmund Freud's theory of psychoanalysis which fuelled Bunuel's ideology. 

Levi Strauss' theory of binary oppositions can be applied to both narratives as an exploration of psychological themes related to a character's behaviour. In L'Age d'Or the primary opposition is sex vs repression: the two lovers vs the bourgeoisie which is the overarching narrative thread. For example, in the film's first sequence, documentary footage shows scorpions killing a rat, the intertitles explaining their behaviour as 'governed by instinct'. In relation to Bunuel's interest in Freud's psychoanalysis theory, this scene can be viewed as an anchoring thematic idea for the film, the sexual plight of the two lovers tussling in mud against a rocky landscape making a thematic link between the primal violence of the scorpions and primal instincts of the lovers, their behaviour governed by the psychoanalytical 'pleasure drive' in the unconscious 'id' as theorised by Freud. The lovers are pulled apart by bourgeois men, dressed in top hats and suits, as they congregate at the landscape. While these scenes are illogical in the narrative and seemingly disconnected from each other - establishing the film's episodic nature - Bunuel's ideology can explain the reasoning for this; 'In a rigidly hierarchal society, sex - which represents no barriers and obeys no laws - can at any moment become an agent of chaos'. His quote suggests that the impossibility of sexual consummation leads to violence and displacement. Exampled in L'Age d'Or, when the lovers finally meet, there is disturbing graphic imagery of the woman orally fondling the toes of a statue. Meanwhile, in a simultaneous narrative, there is a diegetic orchestra at a bourgeois garden party, both scenes cross-cutting between each other. At the diegetic crescendo the lovers bang heads, a reaction shot of the man presented as a response to a discontinuous sequence of clergymen walking over a bridge. Their irrational performances, such as when the orchestra conductor leaves suddenly clasping his head in agony, parallel to the man, to then meet and kiss the woman. Combined with unchronological editing that functions to bridge a narrative, the irrational behaviour withholds psychological insight of the character's desires perhaps as an exploration of the unconscious mind supported by Freud's psychoanalysis theory. The primary opposition within Un Chien Andalou is sex vs violence/death. This is notably exampled as a man gropes a woman after witnessing an androgynous figure being run over, the repression of the church alluded to when he attempts to reach her while dragging clergyman and the 10 commandments among disturbing imagery of two dead donkeys on pianos, perhaps suggesting a fear of death and restriction of the bourgeoise. By Bunuel connecting such grotesque imagery to the church he symbolises it in a negative light, something holding people back from their desires, of which are made illogical through the editing and thus withholding psychological insight. 

Psychological insight is also withheld through repeated narrative codes - a Roland Barthes theory - with information presented about character and their desires through editing and performance, with narrative motifs such as the striped box in Un Chien Anadolu; these are never resolved, expanded upon, or explained, withholding psychological motivations. Enigma codes are presented in Un Chien Anadolu through intertitles, performance, and editing which offer seemingly purposeless narrative information to the spectator. For example, the man in a nun habit and who rode a bicycle earlier the film lies confused on a bed, followed by a man wearing a light suit and fedora entering his room and becoming hostile in ordering the man to stand against the wall, an enigma code created, the spectator positioned to expect a logical conclusion to this scene. Despite the intertitle, 'sixteen years ago', the scene resumes as before, the camera blurred and the action captured in slow motion establishing a dreamlike, surrealist atmosphere. The man against the wall begins to shoot the other, the book in his hand illogically swapped for two guns - another enigma code. In a dramatic cut, the man having been shot falls against the bare back of a woman, the location changed. The irregularity of character behaviour and chronology suggests their psychological motives are withheld from the viewer, such ambiguity further confusing the spectator intentionally created through enigma codes. The intertitle at the beginning of the film, 'Once Upon a Time' is also used to suggest a traditional narrative, which is grotesquely subverted through the storytelling presented in the match cuts: a thin cloud passing over the moon, and a razor passing over an eye. Therefore, character behaviour is presented in associated images but is left unvisited in the rest of the film occurring as episodic events rather than a cohesive narrative, withholding psychological reasoning and justification for this narrative disruption. Bunuel as a surrealist used such narrative ambiguity to jolt the viewer and thus make them an active spectator in attempting to make links and understand such ambiguity and thus access the unconscious mind. Semantic codes are applied more frequently in L'Age d'Or, such as the extravagant mansion and fashion of the bourgeoisie during the second half of the film. Inside a decadent room of this mansion, a horse and cart pass through and a maid collapses from an internal fire; at both disruptive events, coded as acts of the peasantry, the surrounding middle and upper classes ignore and resume their sophisticated interactions which suggests perhaps an ignorance, disassociation, or a simply surreal mood, though from Bunuel's distaste of the Bourgeoise these semantic codes are most likely used to frame the class in a negative light in attempt to rouse upper society. Furthermore, sematic codes are used in the representation of the depraved '120 days of Sodom' allusion at the end of the film - of which offers no traditional resolution to the film, perhaps connoting an unresolved desire within the couple - as religious figures strongly suggested to be led by Jesus from the white robes and beard; a complete attack from Bunuel as a projection of his resentment towards the catholic church. Such symbolic representations in the incoherent narrative through semantic codes of religion and class withhold psychological insight into character, Bunuel consciously mocking Church, State, etiquette, and civilization in generalised representations in L’Age D’Or and Un Chien Andalou. This is because the Surrealists were self-proclaimed champions of the unconscious mind and wished to allude to one's unconscious thoughts in their art, purposely ambiguous so the spectator forms an individual set of ideas.