Lust Souls: The Phantom of the Monastery

Some films are better served if we assess them in terms of their historical context, considering whatever the director’s intent might have been in making them, while others gain from taking them at face value, focusing on what the images themselves are saying regardless of little else than inherent film grammar. This is the sort of revisionist approach that allows for a novel like Cervantes’ Don Quixote, which was regarded as a work of humour when it was first published in the 17th century, to be universally accepted today as a profound philosophical meditation. Not that El fantasma del convento (The Phantom of the Monastery, Fernando de Fuentes, 1934), a classic of Mexican Cinema’s Golden Age, is going to help us solve life’s riddles, but we’ll probably have a more rewarding time zoning in on its sexual innuendos and religious esoterica than making a case for it as a timeless horror film, given the occasional involuntary giggles it can elicit. This Phantom is no Vampyr (Carl Theodor Dreyer, 1932). If anything, we could take this film as a ghost story ridden with a feeble attempt at delivering the morality tale of “You shall not covet your – best friend’s, in this case – wife,” but The Phantom of the Monastery actually blossoms when we embrace it as an arthouse precursor of the films that Luis Buñuel would be making in Mexico predominantly in the ’50s, such as Susana (1951), Él (This Strange Passion, 1953), and Nazarín (1959): it is an irreverent tale that defies social conventions by smuggling and heightening sexuality into, of all places, a religious setting in a profoundly Catholic country.

Add to the above that The Phantom of the Monastery also foreshadows convincing elements of magical realism, which tends to be so elusive in cinema, and we can’t help but celebrate the belated resurrection of this vibrant film. The narrative is consistently rooted in believable naturalism that forces us to question the characters’ and our own perception of reality. And thank God, nothing is ever explained, opening thought-provoking possibilities of interpretation.

The film revolves around a contemporary ’30s Mexican upper-middle class threesome – Cristina (Marta Ruel), Alfonso (Enrique del Campo), and Eduardo (Carlos Villatoro) – who are introduced through a series of frontal medium close-ups that conveys in no-frills cinematic shorthand their essence and entangled dynamics. The story itself begins with Eduardo dangling from a ravine. Cristina half-heartedly stretches out her hand and Alfonso butts in to save his friend. From their chemistry and body language we assume that Alfonso and Cristina are the official couple until, lo and behold, Alfonso tells Cristina, “Don’t listen to your husband, he’s more superstitious than the Indians.” Racism aside, Cristina couldn’t care less that her husband almost fell off a precipice, and her contempt for him throughout the movie suggests that, had he done so, well, good riddance. 

Lost as they are, our heroes are discussing the possibility of spending the night in a nearby, allegedly abandoned monastery when an ominous stranger with his dog Sombra (“Shadow”) appears out of the blue and offers to guide them there. Eduardo is as reticent as Alfonso and Cristina are excited by the prospect. “Yes, Alfonso, this could be a great night,” she says to him with puppy eyes while standing next to her oblivious husband. In his perpetual state of cluelessness, Eduardo reminds me of Hutter, the simpleton in Nosferatu, eine Symphonie des Grauens (Nosferatu: A Symphony of Horror, F.W. Murnau, 1922), who throughout the entire movie fails to realise that his wife Ellen wants to escape her life of boredom and frigidity with him.

At the Monastery of Silence, they are welcomed by a toothless monk who presciently warns them that there’s nothing to fear in the House of God, provided they do not harbour any impure desires. Reverse psychology carries the day: Alfonso and Cristina look at each other in sync and cross the threshold arm-in-arm. Once inside, Eduardo whines that all kinds of strange things are happening, but frankly there’s nothing here alien to any self-respecting monastery dating back to colonial Mexico: the overall labyrinthine feeling of isolation and entrapment, taciturn monks wandering through shadowy corridors (one caught in the rapture of self-flagellation), and phantasmagorical artwork of Christ, saints, and virgins executed by Indigenous artists who imbued them with pagan symbolism as a form of cultural resistance.

They are assigned separate cells. Alfonso visits Eduardo, and the instant he steps out of his friend’s cell, Cristina summons him. Alfonso is taken aback by her rashness, since Eduardo is but a few steps away. “Eduardo… Why didn’t he just fall into the ravine?” she wonders. In the tradition of Catholic iconography that incites physical ecstasy, Cristina adds, “This monastery, this loneliness, I don’t know what’s up with me, but today I’m capable of anything… Come in!” And just as Alfonso is about to cross that line, they’re interrupted by an approaching monk, the quintessentially Buñuelian reversal of fate in which religion sabotages sexual desire. In response to the coitus killer, Alfonso and Cristina choose different paths: he follows the Eros/Thanatos lull and is drawn to a mortuary cell barred with an imposing cross and the Latin legend “Cursed be he who, in the name of flesh, forgets God.” As to Cristina, she berates Eduardo for always making a fool of himself in front of Alfonso. 

Soon after, the trio finds themselves having dinner with the Prior (Paco Martínez) and his 12 monks, who emulate the replica of Da Vinci’s 1498 The Last Supper hovering above. Sombra, the dog we saw in the ravine, is also present, though the Prior insists that it has never left the monastery. The vigilant Prior notices Cristina reaching out for Alfonso’s hand while Eduardo, safely beyond reason, eats his meal. The Prior stares down the would-be lovers, Cristina lets go, and a raucous gust of wind invades the room, unsettling the monks in a highly charged, Eisenstein-like tracking shot. The Prior announces that “the struggle is not over yet.” There is enough ambivalence here for him to be referring either to a supernatural malignant presence or to the all-too-human promise of sex and adultery lurking underneath. He grabs a crucifix and leaves the refectory followed by his monks. Curious as ever, Cristina wants to go after them. Alfonso agrees and Eduardo contests until he senses that their food has turned into ashes. Thus, off they go to spy on the monks.

Depending on our understanding of sanity, the Prior carries out a religious ritual as normal or as peculiar as the neighbours’ shenanigans in Rosemary’s Baby (Roman Polanski, 1968). When all is said and done, the Prior announces that they have overcome “him”. Back at the dinner table, ashes are food again, and the Prior feels compelled to unravel what is going on… no easy feat. Remember the barred cell to which Alfonso was drawn earlier? It turns out that therein dwelled Brother Rodrigo, who had once lusted after his best friend’s wife. “He desired her with such passion that he would have given his life to hold her in his arms,” the Prior asserts. Cristina turns to Alfonso, who looks down sheepishly. In another memorable shot, the camera tracks to Eduardo, perfectly clueless, as the Prior talks about how adultery was only deterred by friendship. Despite such brotherly love, Rodrigo found a book that taught him how a man can achieve his greatest desire in exchange for a soul. One morning, his friend woke up no more. The Prior’s cautionary tale has only managed to turn Cristina on: she smiles suggestively at Alfonso, takes out a pin from her blouse, and carves the word “COWARD” on the table, coaxing Alfonso to take action. 

Late that night Alfonso returns to his cell and finds Cristina waiting for him. All bets are off. Cristina declares she wants to be with Alfonso, and Eduardo can go to hell. Alfonso is torn for about 15 seconds, and they kiss. As soon as their lips meet, repression, guilt, and an iota of common sense all kick in, and Alfonso orders her to leave. Cristina’s contempt is now not just reserved for her husband but for all men. On her way out she warns Alfonso that what he has just done is irreparable.

Alfonso is left to contemplate his fate. He goes to Cristina’s cell and finds her door locked. He asks for forgiveness and confesses, “I was mad, I didn’t know what I was saying.” So much for his morals and loyalty to Eduardo. To her credit, Cristina doesn’t open the door. Think what you will of Cristina, but at least she is reliably self-centered, whereas Alfonso keeps swaying between tugs of self-righteousness and the lure of irrational desire. As he is heading back to his cell, rejected and dejected, Alfonso is possessed by a moment of total lucidity, in an uncanny close-up by US expat cinematographer Ross Fisher.

Alfonso is prompted to trespass the forbidden cell of his alter ego, Brother Rodrigo, a rotting corpse patiently lying in wait. Its mummified hand motions towards a dusty old manuscript that illuminates Alfonso as to how to make his most burning desire come true. Our antihero speaks out loud the two relevant words for his Faustian bargain: “Cristina… Eduardo”. The book bleeds the word “Morirá” (“Shall die”). Alfonso looks back at the corpse: POV of an effeminate hand wearing a wedding ring. The first time I watched The Phantom of the Monastery I relished this moment, believing that Rodrigo had turned into Cristina and the quasi-lovers were finally going to attain carnal knowledge. But de Fuentes fooled me: the camera pans to reveal Eduardo dead with an expression reminiscent of Heathcliff at the end of Emily Brontë’s 1847 Wuthering Heights. Alfonso panics, tries but fails to escape, and histrionically passes out.

The following morning Alfonso wakes up on the other side of the forbidden door. Eduardo and Cristina are looking for him, and he is understandably relieved to see them. They meet another toothless character, the concierge (José I. Rocha), who shows them around to ascertain that the monastery has lain in ruins for years. The living monks are nowhere to be found; only 13 mummies peacefully lying in open coffins. Most significantly, among the rubble Cristina finds the word “COBARDE” that she carved the previous night at dinner – a tangible proof that whatever they lived (or died?) through the night was not a collective dream or hallucination. This is also consistent with the viewer’s experience of a film assuredly directed by de Fuentes within the stylistic parameters of a realist style.

The trio leaves the monastery, with the concierge mocking them behind their backs. As far as we know, he might be of the same ilk as the monks. And while we’re at it, who was the stranger who brought them to the monastery in the first place? Could that have been Rodrigo himself in his pre-monkish incarnation? Far from there being solely one “fantasma del convento”, all the characters in this film, ghostly or not, seem to be trapped in some kind of liminal space, à la L’année dernière à Marienbad (Last Year at Mariembad, Alan Resnais, 1961).

Bewildered as they are, Cristina, Eduardo, and Alfonso concede that they lived what they lived, saw what they saw, and felt what they felt. As Alfonso puts it, “Who knows if they lived or we died for one night.” What they’ll do with this newly acquired wealth of self-knowledge remains yet to be seen. The last shot of The Phantom of the Monastery shows the threesome, arms entwined, crossing a bridge whose destination lies beyond the confines of the frame, with sheep mirroring them on the foreground. Spanning the arch of Mexican Cinema’s Golden Age, Buñuel ended one of his masterpieces, El ángel exterminador (The Exterminating Angel, 1962) with a shot of a flock of sheep entering a church from where humans will never escape. Amen.

El fantasma del convento/The Phantom of the Monastery (1934 Mexico 85 mins)

Prod Co: Producciones FESA Prod: Jorge Pezet Dir: Fernando de Fuentes Scr: Fernando de Fuentes, Jorge Pezet, Juan Bustillo Oro Phot: Ross Fisher Mus: Max Urban Ed: Fernando de Fuentes Art Dir: Fernando A. Rivero

Cast: Marta Ruel, Enrique del Campo, Carlos Villatoro, Paco Martínez, Victorio Blanco