Simon of the Desert (film)

Infobox_Film
name = Simon of the Desert

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caption = Poster
writer = Julio Alejandro
Luis Buñuel
starring = Claudio Brook
Silvia Pinal
Hortensia Santoveña
Luis Aceves Castañeda
director = Luis Buñuel
producer = Gustavo Alatriste
movie_music =
distributor = Producciones Alatriste
released = 1959 (Mexico)
runtime = 42 min.
language = Spanish
music =
awards = | imdb_id = 0059719
budget =

"Simon of the Desert" (Spanish: "Simón del desierto") is a 1965 film directed by Luis Buñuel. It is loosely based on the story of the ascetic 5th-century Syrian saint Simeon Stylites, who lived for 36 years on top of a column.

"Simon of the Desert" is the third (after "Viridiana" and "The Exterminating Angel") of three movies that directed by Buñuel, starring Silvia Pinal and Claudio Brook and produced by her husband Gustavo Alatriste.

Synopsis

Simón, the son of Simeon Stylites, has lived for 6 years, 6 weeks and 6 days atop an eight-meter pillar in the middle of the desert, praying for spiritual purification. A congregation of priests and peasants salute him and offer him a brand new pillar to stand on and carry on his mission. He comes down the pillar and is offered priesthood, but refuses because he considers himself unworthy, and forsakes his aging mother for the love of God before climbing up his new pillar. He then apparetly heals an amputee missing both his hands, and the congregation quickly splits unimpressed, leaving Simón alone.

Time goes by and Simón meets a number of regular characters - a handsome priest whom he condemns on grounds of vanity, a dwarf herder and his mother, who comes to live close to him but remains neglected of attention. A woman (Silvia Pinal), Satan, visists him three times: first as an innocent girl chanting curses in Latin, second disguised as God. She constantly tries to make Simón give up his task and climb down the pillar. She even possesses one of the priests that visit him who is consequently exorcised.

The third time, a coffin trails across the desert and finally stops next to the pillar. It opens up to reveal Satan, clad in a toga, who at last climbs up the pillar and vanishes with Simón for good. In an anachronistic turn, the couple find themselves sitting inside a disco in modern-day society. Simón protests about wanting to go home, but Satan refuses to let him go. The film ends with a party of '60s hipsters dancing to "Radioactive Flesh".

Background

In 1960 Buñuel returned to his home country Spain after a long-term exile in Mexico in order to direct "Viridiana". The film scandalized the Vatican and the government, which prompted Buñuel into a second exile back to Mexico. Here he directed "The Exterminating Angel" in 1962, and in the line of its predecessor, the film was critical of religion. "Simón del desierto" was the last of the trilogy starring Silvia Pinal and Claudio Brook (the latter usually in secondary roles) that controversially dealt with religion while retaining certain elements of Buñuel's earlier surrealist period. The film was based on a novel of Buñuel, and was adapted by Buñuel and frequent collaborator Julio Alejandro.

External links

*imdb title | id=0059719 | title=Simon of the Desert

###@@@KEY@@@###succession box
title=Special Jury Prize, Venice
years=1965
tied with "I am Twenty" and "Modiga Mindre Män"
before="The Gospel According to St. Matthew"
tied with "Hamlet
after="Yesterday Girl"
tied with "Chappaqua"