Why two different actresses?


I didn't get that. In the beginning of the movie I thought that it would be explained later on but no. Does anyone know the reason for this?







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It's not explained in the movie. But Bunuel got the idea of two different actresses in order to show two different situations/conditions.
Angela Molina plays the voluptuous seductress and
Carole Bouquet plays the frigid intellectual.

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I dont think that's true...

Buñuel is crazy...that's the reason...

Under the Paving Stones, The Beach

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Surrealist and fantasy elements do not mean that the director is crazy, it just means he doesn't make the kind of movie you expect ... Michael Bay does movies with simple themes and linear plots , you might like some of his.


But you ARE Blanche ... and I AM.

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What the hell do you want, idiot?

I can tell you both...I love Buñuel and he is crazy (I was spanking homosexuals in the public bathrooms!!!!)

Now you can go and sleep with your friend michael bay, *beep*

Under the Paving Stones, The Beach

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he is crazy, i do agree, but isn't that the main reason which makes his movies different and interesting? he is crazy but in a good way. and i like him because i feel welcome in his world.

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Well here's what's really happened according to Jean-Claude Carrière (screenwriter of 6 Buñuel films) and Luis Buñuel himself.

1st of all according with Carrière the idea about using 2 actresses to play the same role was suggested to him by Buñuel long before this movie were in production, but the idea was abandoned as something non-practical.
When 'Cet obscure' was "greenlighted" plenty of actress were auditioned, they chose Maria Schneider (Last Tango in Paris), but either she quitted arguing there were "too many nude scenes" (If this is true that would be quite ironic because in 'Ultimo tango a Parigi' she appears naked in more scenes than Bouquet's and Molina's scenes combined in 'Cet obscure objet of désir').
Other sources suggests that Buñuel didn't cast Maria Schneider simply because he didn't feel that Maria could pull out the job. The production of the movie halted for a brief period and then Buñuel told to Carrière and Silberman (producer): "Do you remember that crazy idea about casting two actress for the role?. What about if we try it?" Something along those lines. The point is that once Maria Schneier left the project Buñuel cast Ángela Molina and Carole Bouquet in order to portray both the same role. Carole would portray the virginal beauty that every man "desires" while Ángela the temptation and lust that drives men crazy and combined they both would be the pleasure and torment of any man: "That Obscure Object of Desire". A woman to live and die for, to hate and to love intensely.

That was the masterstroke of Buñuel genious. No one else would have dared to use 2 actresses in order to play the same role. Since then, that narrative device have been used basically in psychological thrillers and horror movies, but nobody used it before Buñuel.

You can read more about it here, besides I suggest you to listen the interview to Jean Claude Carrière included on Criterion DVD:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/That_Obscure_Object_of_Desire#Casting

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The story you recount may well be true, but I recall reading somewhere that Bunuel had to fire Angela Molina for unreliable behavior and subsequently hired Carole Boquet. Then in order to avoid having to trash the scenes he had already shot, he hit upon the device of using two actresses.

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Well, whatever the reason, it comes across real good as a kind of split personality deal. Maybe more symbolism or whatever you want to read into it.
I see the credits on imdb list the actresses separately. That's different than one actor playing two people in the same movie shown on the same line.

So maybe this idea isn't revolutionary, just kinda like swapping the sides of the credits. Instead of 1 for 2 roles you get 2 for 1 role.

Actually, I was just trying to keep up with the subtitles. I don't read too fast.

tres slow. etc. So I didn't get the double entendre until way into this flick.



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A vague "I read somewhere" vs. a detailed explanation. Yeah, I'll take the other explanation, even if I hadn't seen the interview that that person is talking about.

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Great so Im not crazy and can continue watching

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I think it would be stupid to think Bunuel just used two actresses for 'techinical' issues; someone quitting in the middle of filming, and not wanting to 'trash' the material filmed. One who knows Bunuel, knows that he was almost like a perfectionist with regards to cinema. For instance, in the last scene of That Obscure Object of Desire he came to re-film the scene after a month because he didn't like it.

To be honest I didn't even notice that there were two actresses at first. It's because the emotional charge works so well; the sympathetic warm side and the frigid, dominative side. Even that it is CLEARLY announced in the opening credits that there are two actresses for the role I didn't see it. Until the film was over. I was so caught up in the story. Of course one reason might be that I watched this on television, with subtitles, English subtitles and I'm not a native speaker. But still I think it was quite amazing. It's been quite fun analyzing the reason for this and to my mind it's quite clear. First of all the two sides of Conchita but also the theme of dichotomy that plays throughout the film. The two different worlds; the old world of Matheo which is disappearing, and the new world of terrorism - this culminates in many scenes, but the image where poor shacks are revealed in front of high skyscrapers is pretty illustrating.

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Also watch Double Life of Veronique.

Please watch my shorthttp://www.imdb.com/title/tt1424542/, click trailer (its the film!)

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I understand the reasons, but I must say, I never thought it worked well. It comes across as contrived, and that's never a good thing.

It MAY have worked, even wonderfully well, had he used a different actress for each scene that Conchita was in - so, many more than just two actresses.
Or not, I don't know.
But I suspect it would look less contrived than it does.





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Clearly Bunuel originally intended a single actress to portray conchita (Maria Schneider). Maria Schneider's bloody minded intransigence just before the start of shooting forced Bunuel to fire her (one assumes that getting sodomised by Marlon Brando in Last Tango put her in a bad mood). This course of events threw Bunuel into a state of despair and he was all set to cancel the whole project. Apparently, while drowning his sorrows with alcoholic beverages in a Madrid Bar, Bunuel had the unusual idea of using two actresses and the project was once again a "go". Don't pay too much attention to the theory that Bouquet and Molina portray two aspects of Conchita's personality. Bunuel was a SURREALIST director. Plot devices do not have to make logical sense; often the very opposite is the case.

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"In his autobiography, My Last Sigh (1983), Buñuel explains (pp. 46–47) the decision to use two actresses to play Conchita:

In 1977, in Madrid, when I was in despair after a tempestuous argument with an actress who'd brought the shooting of That Obscure Object of Desire to a halt, the producer, Serge Silberman, decided to abandon the film altogether. The considerable financial loss was depressing us both until one evening, when we were drowning our sorrows in a bar, I suddenly had the idea (after two dry martinis) of using two actresses in the same role, a tactic that had never been tried before. Although I made the suggestion as a joke, Silberman loved it, and the film was saved.

The book does not identify the actress who had caused the "tempestuous argument," though Buñuel makes it clear (p. 250) that she was neither Carole Bouquet nor Angela Molina.

In Luis Buñuel: The Complete Films (2005), editors Bill Krohn and Paul Duncan identify the actress as Maria Schneider, writing (pp. 177–78) the following in regard to the idea of using two actresses to play Conchita:

... Buñuel found himself proposing it to Silberman when it became clear after three days of shooting that Maria Schneider was indeed not going to be able to play the part. Carole Bouquet and Angela Molina stepped in ."

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Clear as water, thanks!

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