The Stranger

The two least interesting things about Luis Buñuel’s Viridiana, which was shot in 1961 in his native Spain, are its obvious attack on Christianity, in terms of content, and its surrealistic moments and imagery, in terms of style. What makes Viridiana a major work of film art is, instead, its profound critique of poverty. The story is about a rich old man, his beautiful niece, Viridiana, and his handsome son, Jorge. After the rich man fails to seduce his niece, a nun, he commits suicide. The niece and the son then assume control of the dead man’s property. The son modernizes all of it, and the niece turns a part of it into a home for the homeless. But because the poor are not simply poor, simply people who need help, but people who have a real will to power, Viridiana’s charity explodes in her face. To help the poor you must also appreciate their power, their strength, their deepest and darkest desires. The poor are human beings. This is the final and richest meaning of Buñuel’s Viridiana. By Charles Mudede