Raúl Ruiz Movies

A series of compounding dramatic situations, drawn from Georges Polti's '36 Dramatic Situations' and acted out in shadowplay and voiceover.

The house of the director has a door out to the sidewalk. This gate separates the inside from the outside. The interior contains the filmmaker's personal story and his world of objects, thoughts and imaginations. Outer space contains the city of Santiago de Chile. The stories of the world inside...

If any single piece can act as a key to Ruiz, it may be the 1997 short Le Film à Venir (The Film to Come). The titular film is a holy fragment of celluloid that can only be seen by a secret society known as the Philokinetes. They watch it on a loop, somnambulating through a life that is unreal by...

A parody of anthropology, linguistics, and cultural imperialism. The film follows an unlikely team of linguists into the wilds of an ersatz Patagonia to study the last speakers of a dying language. That language apparently consists of a single word, which therefore means everything.

A documentary on the exiled Chilean painter Sotelo which focuses on the painter's voice rather than the paintings themselves.

This eccentric short directed by Keith Griffiths, outlines Ruiz’s work, biography and preoccupations and includes a rare interview with the director.

A country house in the evening. A couple returns home to find a bailiff inside, busy taking inventory.

Eleven-year old Dora (Nathalie Manet) is forced to chase after clues concerning her inventor-father's death while being chased by thugs working for big industry. Not only is she seeking to understand her father's mysterious death, but some of the clues he gave her indicate that he invented...

Reflections on television debate and rhetoric through impromptu discussions.

A chronicle of Raúl Ruiz’s production of Michèle Reverdy’s opera “Médée”.

A blind moviegoer tells his niece about the time he screened Casablanca to a rural village fifty years ago.

Reel 23 of Gérard Courant’s on-going Cinematon series.

Set in 1973 during the coup d'etat in Chile, Max recalls his encounters in London during World War II with French aviator Antoine, a childhood hero he first met in his native country one morning in 1932 and who initiated him to the wonders of aviation.

Ruiz’s short about Pieter Wiersma, a Dutch sculptor who makes intricate sandcastles.

Tunisia itself is the subject; we wanted to render the genius of the site. Tunisia is almost the central character of this little film: we see the relation of the city to the sea, the traces that bear witness to its foundation, the remains of Carthage, the symbolism of the recently discovered...

In a bar in Santiago, two old men talk over their past. This is a strange discussion. In fact, they talk of themselves as if they were dead. We don't know what is true or false, what is dream or reality.

Portrait of "cinéaste" Ruiz, seemingly at his typewriter, in Courant's ongoing "Cinématon" series.

A coin and a cup of coffee on a table top. Raúl Ruiz gets the most from this minimal set-up, both visually and through the laconic soundtrack.

The most critically celebrated Rue essay of 1979 was the two-part Petit Manuel d'Histoire de France, directed by the exiled Chilean filmmaker Raul Ruiz, who brought to this commission some of the stylistic fabulism for which he was becoming known in avant-garde cinema.

The young Marcela leaves her small Chilean village and travels to Santiago in order to find work as a secretary.