Buñuel in the Labyrinth of the Turtles

There was dual outrage when, in 1932, Luis Buñuel produced the short film Las Hurdes. Not only had he exposed the deplorable conditions in a remote hill village in Carlist Spain, he also broke the most sacrosanct rule of documentary film-making by consciously tampering with reality in staging scenes for the camera. As Salvador Simó reveals in this innovative animation inspired by Fermín Solís's graphic novel, Buñuel wanted to make a statement after his scandalising collaborations with Salvador Dalí on Un Chien Andalou (1929) and L'Age d'Or (1930). Armed with funds from anarchist Ramón Acín, he shocked audiences out of their complacency by stage-managing the death of a child, as well as scenes of animal cruelty involving chickens, donkeys and goats. Incorporating Buñuel's stark monochrome footage into the stylised animation, Solís captures his evolution from Surrealist prankster to iconoclastic satirist, although the flashbacking subplot about seeking to please a demanding father is less persuasive.