Subida al cielo

Okay Mexican era Bunuel about a young man traveling by bus to his dying mother's hometown where she has a will on record. If he doesn't recover that will and have his mother put her thumbprint on it, his oldest brother, a very greedy man, will have the legal right to divide the property amongst the family. Most of the film is about the bus ride and the adventures the people on the bus have. There are some very nice scenes and touches, but it doesn't rank as one of Bunuel's strongest. It does, however, contain probably the best surreal sequence of any of his Mexican films. I haven't seen them all, so maybe I should just say a more prominent surreal sequence than his more famous Mexican films, i.e., Los Olvidados, El, or Nazarin (not counting anything he made after he returned to Mexico from Spain after Viridiana, i.e., The Exterminating Angel and Simon of the Desert, both of which are more "pure" surrealism).

IMHO,a minor work in Bunuel's extraordinary filmography.The beginning is quite surprising:it recalls "Las Hurdes" with its documentary side and its voice over.But of course,it's not as tragic as the 1932 opus.

There's a theme Bunuel would develop (with great results ): the impossibility to do what you want to do: the heroes of "le Charme Discret de La Bourgeoisie " trying to get a good meal; or in "Cet Obscur Objet Du Desir" ,the woman who never wants to have sex with the hero.Here the young man's wedding night is postponed .But he will find solace (or is it a dream?) in Raquel's arms.

A lot of bizarre things happen on the bus,the birth and the death of a child,notably, and surrealism is not far way when apple peelings become some kind of umbilical cord.

This is a slight but highly enjoyable Bunuel film that makes for a fine companion piece to the later ILLUSION TRAVELS BY STREETCAR (1954) – with which it shares its leading lady (Lilia Prado) and its folksy 'road movie' theme While the IMDb gives its running time as being 85 minutes, the copy I acquired runs for just 74 (as does the R2 Yume DVD and the NFT print I caught back in January 2007); even so, the film somehow manages to lose steam in its latter stages and proceeds to end rather lamely!

Having said that, there is still much to savor here: Prado burns up the screen as a bombshell nymph who, sporting the skimpiest of outfits, teases the life out of the just-married protagonist (Esteban Marquez) and is herself pursued by a deluded politician (Manuel Donde'). Another performer that stands out is Luis Aceves Castaneda (who would go on to play Ricardo two years later in Bunuel's powerful version of WUTHERING HEIGHTS) as the laid-back bus conductor; in fact, both he and Donde' were singled out for recognition at that year's Ariel awards (as were the film itself, its original story and Bunuel for his direction)! Incredibly enough, such a seemingly simple storyline necessitated the collaboration of five writers(!) including poet Manuel Altolaguirre, an old acquaintance of Bunuel's from his student days, and on whose real-life experiences the film was based. Amusingly enough, the editor on this one, Rafael Portillo, would go on to direct all three "Aztec Mummy" movies!

ASCENT TO HEAVEN (equally well-known under the more prosaic title Mexican BUS RIDE) also competed at that year's Cannes Film Festival (where it surprisingly won the "Avant-Garde" award!) against such worthier contenders as Orson Welles' OTHELLO (the eventual co-winner, with Renato Castellani's TWO PENNYWORTH OF HOPE, of the Grand Prize), Vincente Minnelli's AN American IN Paris (1951), William Wyler's DETECTIVE STORY (1951), Christian-Jaque's FANFAN LA TULIPE, Vittorio De Sica's UMBERTO D, Elia Kazan's VIVA ZAPATA! and three more movies which still lie in my dreaded unwatched pile: Andre' Cayatte's WE ARE ALL MURDERERS, Alberto Lattuada's THE OVERCOAT and Gian Carlo Menotti's THE MEDIUM (1951)!

Eventful bus rides have long been a tradition in Cinema and the vintage British examples Friday THE THIRTEENTH (1933) and THE RUNAWAY BUS (1954) are two more I own but, alas, have yet to check out. In his treatment of this theme, Bunuel includes some pertinent parallel occurrences: a boy's childbirth and a little girl's funeral; a mother's birthday celebration (complete with musical interlude) and another one's lonely death; the missed meeting between Marquez and his mother is made up for in the way he, ironically, adopts treachery – by imprinting his mother's fingerprints on the unsigned legal document after her demise – to ensure that her deathbed wishes are observed!

Indeed, the protagonist's constantly thwarted attempts of reaching a notary in time for his moribund mother to put her will on paper – interrupting his own wedding so that he and his nephew will not be cheated out of their rightful inheritance by his two greedy brothers – looks forward not only to ILLUSION TRAVELS BY STREETCAR itself but also to Bunuel's much later Oscar-winning masterpiece THE DISCREET CHARM OF THE BOURGEOISIE (1972). Similarly, Prado's initially unsuccessful attempts to seduce Marquez recall Fernando Rey's unenviable situation in THAT OBSCURE OBJECT OF DESIRE (1977). Besides, the influx of American tourists into this Mexican everyday scenario predates similar occurrences in both ILLUSION and THE CRIMINAL LIFE OF ARCHIBALDO DE LA CRUZ (1955). Bunuel's indictment of progress is also amusingly brought out here in a sequence where the bus, stuck in the mud-banks of a stream, is eventually pulled out of its predicament by two oxen guided by a little girl (rather than a nearby tractor which is equally ineffective in these aquatic surroundings – despite having its driver held at gunpoint by the irritable politician)!

The deceptively spiritual title – not only is the island setting of San Jeronimito without a church (so that marrying couples need to sail to a neighboring island to consecrate their union) but it specifically refers to a particularly dangerous local mountain pass – could also be referring to the impending death of Marquez's mother; the fate that, according to a drunken Castaneda, awaits his saintly mother for bearing such a godless son; or even a metaphorical allusion to Marquez's ecstasy at the consummation of his lust for Prado (while stranded between two ledges on that very titular spot, no less)! His long-repressed desires had already been externalized in an extraordinary dream sequence where he imagines the bus as, first a field (where his dalliance is disturbed by a horde of stray sheep!) and then a stream (where his wife turns into his lover) and, finally, his mother is propped atop a pillar – 13 years before Bunuel's own SIMON OF THE DESERT! – peeling an apple (like the one that he and Prado had shared moments before) whose skin forms itself into a veritable umbilical cord all the way into her son's mouth! And what should Prado ask him when he wakes up from this reverie if not "Where you thinking of me?" – anticipating the famous opening dream sequence and its aftermath of Bunuel's biggest box office hit BELLE DE JOUR (1967)! Incidentally, another subtly surreal touch is having the bus and another vehicle face each other on a narrow mountain pass where neither of them can possibly reverse to let the other one through...and yet, inexplicably and off-screen, the situation has been resolved by the next shot!

As can be seen from the above, ASCENT TO HEAVEN is no mere populist picaresque comedy; however, I would still single it out as perhaps the ideal 'minor' Bunuel Mexican film to start out with for newcomers and it is unsurprising that the Spanish director himself is said to have been very fond of it.

Subida al cielo is a messy little story probably about the distractions and small miracles happening on everybody's way to heaven. It is short and seems simple, but there are sometimes strange things happening: has anybody the strength to go straight? If one does really go straight, one probably do not even have dreams. Dreams, wishful thinking and miracles like the improbable solution (by a little girl) for getting the bus out of the river with an ox instead of a tractor and the small miracle of the two vehicles that for no apparent reason suddenly CAN pass each other on the narrow path after a short meeting. Furthermore, Buñuel incorporates a few modest but funny dream sequences to emphasize that people (secretly) can think of other things, while they are on their certain way to heaven (the righteous path?). The English title 'Mexican Bus Ride' applies very well I guess: the whole is kind of low profile (probably also low budget :)

The acting is ok, but I never really got into the story, because the editing isn't good and there is no convincing mood to get into, although Buñuel uses some music in this movie. Miniature cars and sets make it fun to watch, but also do not convince. The movie feels more like an exercise than as a message from the heart, but I would like to see it again some time. 5/10

I love Bunuel, and as such I had to see this film even though his Mexican period is my least favorite. I found it at the library (the only Bunuel film they had in fact). What we get is a very sloppy, poorly edited, and VERY poorly subtitled film.

In this little Mexican town, there aren't any legal ways to get married so as long as the groom has the to-be mother-in-law's blessing, then the couple is considered married. Well, before our new couple even get a mile out of town, they are informed that his mother is on her death bed and needs him to go to town to get the man who always takes care of the family's affairs. From there, we get on the bus.

On the bus, we have the silly driver, the town femme fatale, a politician, a couple who become new parents while on the ride, and a few other odd characters. You can see some of Bunuel's surreal effects shine through, if only slightly, in the mishaps along the way. For example, the bus driver tries to make the bus go across a lake at one point which of course it cant and it ends up being a 5 year old girl leading two oxen that saves the day. We also have a scene where the bus comes face to face with another vehicle (that cant go in reverse) on a steep mountain trail. After a few moments, everything is fine again, but we don't know why. Thats Bunuel for you.

Overall, I wouldn't say the film is bad. Its great to see all the stages that a director goes through, especially someone like Bunuel who is one of the finest directors to have ever lived. The biggest flaw with this film, which will hopefully be fixed once this gets a DVD release (Criterion are you listening?), is that the subtitles are quite possibly the worst I've ever seen. the first problem is that they're white and in some cases you cant see the far left or the far right of the words because they stretch off the screen, and the worst part is that you can tell that half of whats being said isn't even translated at all. Thankfully I know a tiny bit of Spanish and the gesticulations of the actors were good enough to allow me to get at least the gist of what was going on. For the most part, you might as well be watching a silent film.

This definitely ends up being an interesting glimpse into the life of 1950s Mexico. Its such a crude life but everyone seems to be happy. Its worth seeing, but only if you're a hardcore Bunuel fan or you are studying Mexican life of the 1950s.