La Mort en ce Jardin

Buñuel uses an interesting genre: The Wages of Fear inspired left wing French film-makers to join Mexican producers and make very violent melodramas with Third Worldish themes. Here, in a Bolivia-type state, clashes between troops and striking miners force a jungle trek on an ill-starred gang: a prostitute (Signoret), a priest (Piccoli), a trader (Vanel), an adventurer (Marchal), a deaf-mute beauty (Girardon). Jungle hazards include snakes, thirst, toilet-paper problems, and the bourgeois joys of looting a wrecked plane. Its garish, vicious action beats Sam Fuller at his own game, and adds philosophical suspense, as jungle paranoia makes Marxist fraternity look as delirious as a Surrealist dream. Co-writer is Raymond Queneau, the Picasso of avant-garde writing.