The interrelationships between meaning(s), form, cinematic technology and surrealist ideology in Luis Buñuel's, Un Chien Andalou (1929)

• Main Author: Kritzinger, Christiaan Cornelius
• Format: Others
• Language: English
• Published: Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University 2012
• Subjects: Surrealism in motion pictures; Motion picture producers and directors > Spain; Photography; Myth; Semiotics
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/10948/d1007847

This study sets out to determine the interrelationship between meaning(s), form (specifically framing and composition), cinematic technology and the surrealist ideology with specific reference to Luis Buñuel’s film, Un Chien Andalou (1929). The study utilises a semiotic framework to analyse the seminal film, as well as the researcher’s short film Facebrick (2012). The semiotic reading is conducted according to key surrealist tenets namely, spatio-­‐temporal disruption, the use of free-­‐association and the inclusion of cultural, religious and sexual symbols as a revolutionary tool. Gillian Rose’s (2007) semiotic framework underpinned by James Monaco’s (1977) schema for analysing the moving image, was utilised to read the selected film texts. A comparative analysis reveals that although the researcher employed different cinematic technology to construct the short film than that available to Buñuel in the 1920s; similar cinematic techniques could be recreated, as the analysis shows, through the use of key surrealist characteristics. Not only did this allow mere reproduction of these techniques, but rather a full appropriation of these techniques within a contemporary context. Thus the techniques, communicate the surreal, both aesthetically and intellectually. The theoretical study provides the foundation for the practical output, creating a conceptual framework that guides the creation of a short film. The practical research component relies on the parameters identified in the semiotic reading. This was facilitated by the characteristics of Surrealism: the disruption of time and space, the inclusion of archetypal symbols and the use of free association. The short film, Facebrick (2012), follows a voyeur obsessed with gazing at three characters. The film explores the human condition in an urban environment drawing from themes such as Jean-­‐Paul Sartre’s gaze theory as well as Freudian themes of identity and sexuality.