The art of seduction

Film-maker Onir is fascinated by Luis Bunuel’s film Belle de Jour
Belle de Jour (Beautiful Woman of the Day),a 1967 French film directed by Spanish film-maker Luis Bunuel,is the classic in my head. It’s the story of a beautiful,young married woman who loves her husband,but cannot bring herself to be physically intimate with him. So,she becomes a prostitute,working in a brothel in the afternoons. 

What fascinated me most about the film was Bunuel’s exploration of female sexuality and the duality in us; when the dream world merges with the real world,a dark,erotic,manipulative and comic world emerges. At the end of the film,one doesn’t know what is real and what is a dream. That’s its beauty; you keep creating your own stories for an end that never was.

I remember seeing this film at the Calcutta Ice Skating Rink for the first time way back in 1984. I had seen it at a film festival where my sister had taken me. The first impression it made on me was magical. And thus,Bunuel,over the next few years,became one of my favourite film-makers whose films I eagerly scouted.
More than two decades since watching it,Belle De Jour continues to fascinate me. Indeed,Catherine Deneuve,who plays the protagonist,seduces you to revisit her over and over again.