Pierre Louys, Buñuel y la mujer

Abstract

That obscure object of desire is the last film of Luis Buñuel. Based on La mujer y el pelele, novel by Pierre Louys, it presents a situation of man in general (represented by the character of Mateo) confronted with the enigma of femininity embodied by a woman (Conchita), who, while seducing him, escapes from him al1 the time. Mateo can't escape from the harassment of the main character which is presented as a true paradigm of the feminine duality. The use of two actresses to portray the same character or Conchita makes this duality even more noticeable. Shocked by the attitude of a woman who while offering herself for pleasure takes away at the same time the possibility of possessing her, Mateo seems to adopt the recommendation of this servant who tells him "a woman is a bag of shit", which will lead him to carry that bag as a symptom of something he cannot get rid of. The final explosion when eve-thing would lead you to think about a happy enduring, with full harmony between man and woman, gives the impression of pointing out the impossibility of such a relationship and t h e unavoidable misencounter among the sexes