The Saragossa Manuscript

Poland (1965)

During a battle in the town of Zaragoza during the Napoleonic Wars, an officer retreats to the second floor of an inn. He finds a strange book wrote by his grandfather!: Alfonso van Worden Alfonso is a young captain of the Walloon Guard. This story is full of adventures. Firstly, he meets 2 beautiful Arabic girls in the basement of an old inn. However, the basement is not a creepy one. It looks like a palace. The women are in love of Alfonso and they want to get married with him. The only one condition is to drink of a scary skull. After that, suddenly, many corpses are surrounded Alfonso. He thinks “What is going on? Was it a dream?” He visit to a priest and he says that he is possessed because of the book. He tell a story about possession. After that, Alfonso tells a story about his father. And his father tells a story about his family... Everybody tells stories in order to explain what the origin of the book is. However Alfonso just to come back to the Arabic Palace and get married with the most beautiful girls he has ever seen...

Today we have a “cinematographic jewel” from Poland. The Saragossa Manuscript was filmed in 1965 with a total running time of 180 minutes. It was too long for a surrealistic movie. So, it was “adapted” to 152 minutes in the USA and 125 in the UK. Fortunately, it was remastered by Martin Scorsese and Francis Ford Coppola and nowadays it is possible to see the full version in DVD. The Saragossa Manuscript is a very curious film, from different points of view. First of all, visually speaking, it looks like a Dali painting. Very complex scenes to show the dark reality of the star. Secondly, the plot it's very tricky with reminiscences of masters such as Ingmar Bergman and Kurosawa. In summary, It is not “easy film”; I just recommended it to film lovers.

Mark: 8.2

To Remember: Some images are like paintings
To Forget: How is it possible to play Flamenco with a Lute????


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Esta obra está bajo una licencia de Creative Commons.