Bunuel_Luis_My_Last_Breath

Madrid-The Reszdencia (I 9 I 7- I 92')) 75"Do you think so?""Yes.""Well, then," Morcillo said, "frankly, it's really the clouds I likemore than anything else! In fact, I think those clouds might be thebest work I've done in years!"I've spent a lifetime collecting examples of that kind of manipulativehumor, which I call mwcillismo. In a way, I suppose, we'reall somewhat morcillist. There's a superb example of it in Lesage'sGil Bias, in the marvelous Bishop of Granada. Morcilli~mo comesfrom an overwhelming desire for unlimited flattery-the morcillistmasochistically provokes criticism (generally justified), only to betterconfound the imprudent soul who falls into the trap.During these years, movie theatres were sprouting all over Madridand attracting an increasingly faithful public. We used to go tothe movies with our fiancees, albeit our motivation had more to dowith the darkness than with whatever film happened to be showing.When we went en masse from the Residencia, however, our preferencesran to American comedy. We loved Ben Turpin, HaroldLloyd, Buster Keaton, and everyone in the Mack Sennett gang.Curiously, Chaplin was our least favorite.Basically, however, movies were still only a form of entertainment.None of us dreamed that film might be a new mode of expression,much less an art form that could compete with poetry, fiction,or painting. Not once during this entire period did I imagine becominga filmmaker. Like so many others, I preferred to write poetry.My first effort, called "Orquestacion," was published in Ultra (orwas it Horizonte?); Gomez de la Serna liked it very much, which washardly surprising, given the extent of his influence on it.THE MOST important Ultraist journal was La Gaeta Literaria, editedby Gimknez Caballero. It published the entire "Generation of 1927"as well as some older authors, several hitherto unknown Catalanpoets, and some writers from Portugal, a country we felt to be asdistant from us as India.