Bunuel_Luis_My_Last_Breath

the film for the first time and had nothing to say about it. He sawit again in Paris, then twice in Cannes, and again in Mexico City,after which he rushed up to me, his face wreathed in smiles."Luis!" he cried happily. "You've done it! It's wonderful! NowI understand it all!"I had, and still have, no idea what he was talking about. It allseemed so simple to me~what was there to understand?On the other hand, when de Sica saw it in Mexico City, hewalked out horrified and depressed. Afterwards, he and my wife,Jeanne, went to have a drink, and he asked her if I was really thatmonstrous, and if I beat her when we made love."When there's a spider that needs getting rid of," she replied,laughing, "he comes looking for me."(Once in Paris, in front of a movie theatre near my hotel, I sawa poster that said, "By Luis Bufiuel . . . the Cruelest Director in theWorld." Such foolishness made me very sad.)The Exterminating Angel was made in Mexico, although I regretthat I was unable to shoot it in Paris or London with European actorsand adequate costumes. Despite the beauty of the house where itwas shot and my effort to select actors who didn't look particularlyMexican, there was a certain tawdriness in many of its aspects. Wecouldn't get any really fine table napkins, for instance, and the onlyone I could show on camera was borrowed from the makeup artist.The screenplay, however, was entirely original. It's the story of agroup of friends who have dinner together after seeing a play, butwhen they go into the living room after dinner, they find that forsome inexplicable reason they can't leave. In its early stages, theworking title was The Castaways of Prwzdence Street, but then I remembereda magnificent title that Jose Bergamin had mentionedwhen he'd talked to me in Madrid the previous year about a play hewanted to write."If I saw The Exterminating Angel on a marquee," I told him, "I'dgo in and see it on the spot."When I wrote him from Mexico asking for news of his play, he