Last films by Buñuel on display at Campo Alegre

Campo Alegre Municipal Theatre features the filmography by Luís Buñuel till the 1st July. There are two sessions per film each day, at 6.30pm and at 9.39pm. These are the last days to watch the cult films by one of the most relevant cinema directors of all times. 

Today, the film La mort en ce jardin ("Death in the Garden") will be screened at Campo Alegre cinema studio. This is a 1956 film by Buñuel, based on the novel by José-André Lacour.

Amid a revolution in a South American mining outpost, a band of fugitives, namely a roguish adventurer (Georges Marchal), a local hooker (Simone Signoret), a priest (Michel Piccoli), an aging diamond miner (Charles Vanel), and the miner's deaf-mute daughter (Michèle Girardon), are forced to flee for their lives into the jungle.

On 30th June, there is the opportunity to appreciate one of the last films directed by Buñuel. "The Phantom of Liberty" (Le Fantôme de la Liberté), starring Pierre-François Pistorio, Hélèna Perdrière and Adriana Asti. Buñuel satirises morality and society. 

The film starts with a scene is inspired by "The Kiss", a short story by Spanish writer Gustavo Adolfo Bécquer and by Francisco Goya's painting The Third of May 1808. The city of Toledo has been occupied by French Napoleonic troops. A firing squad executes a small group of Spanish rebels who cry out "Long live chains!" or "Death to the gabachos!" -a Spanish pejorative term for "Frenchmen".

The troops are encamped in a Catholic church which they desecrate by drinking, singing, and eating the communion wafers. The captain caresses a statue of Doña Elvira de Castañeda and is knocked unconscious by the statue of her husband, Don Pedro López de Ayala. In revenge, the captain exhumes Doña Elvira's body to find her face has not decomposed; there is a suggestion of intended necrophilia.

The cycle devoted to Buñuel concludes on 1st July with the screening of the film "Diary of a Chambermaid (Le journal d'une femme de chambre), a 1964 French-Italian drama film.

This is deemed one of the more realistic films by Buñuel, and it is also highly satirical and reflective of his typical anti-bourgeoisie sentiments. It stars Jeanne Moreau as a chambermaid whose attractiveness is apparent to owners and to servants alike?her femininity charms some, at the same time it brings out envy (or admiration) in others of the household and among adjacent neighbours.

The film was screened in the main competition section of the 65th Berlin International Film Festival.

Teatro Municipal Campo Alegre was inaugurated in 1997, and it is one of the most important cultural poles in the city of Porto. As of November 2004, Medeia Filmes is in charge of organising the theatre's cinema programme.

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Ticket prices:

Regular - 5.50 €

Youth Cards, Students card, senior card - 5.00 €

Mondays (except holidays) - 4.50 €

TRIpass card- 4.00 €