Salvador Dali's Hollywood Dream and Its Realisation

Salvador Dali, a surrealist painter whom is mostly known for his bizarre paintings and ideas. However, not only was he a painter, he was also a writer who ventured into filmmaking. I find it quite amazing that Salvador Dali branched off into film making in the first place. He did not let go of painting altogether, he incorporated it into his projects and used his imagery in which was shown in cinematic works. Many do not know that Dali took a chance at doing different motion pictures in Hollywood. By incorporating his surrealist style into his film, they dive deep into the unconscious mind and are viewed as evoking. I believe that Dali wants his viewers to comprehend surrealism, not only his painting but in his films. His work is anything but ordinary, it will sway you from reality while stimulating your unconsciousness putting you in a dream like state. This state can include terrifying images in the motion pictures.

Upon coming to Hollywood, Salvador Dali made friends along the way which manifested into lifelong relationships, along with the films. This includes him working with some of the biggest names in Hollywood such as Alfred Hitchcock and Walt Disney. Salvador Dali started to compose the lyrics for a musical show in the year 1927. This show was called Être Dieu which translates to 'To Be God'. Dali composed this along with Federico Garcia Lorca one evening in the Café Regina Victoria in Madrid. In Paris, the musical drama was adjusted by the Spanish author Manuel Vazquez Montalban in 1974. While Montalban composed the lyrics, the music was made by Igor Wakhevitch. Amid the chronicle, Dali being the rebellion that he is, would not corporate. He would not follow the text composed by Montalban, and rather, he started to state that “Salvador Dali never repeats himself.” [footnoteRef:3] Salvador Dali's varying media musical drama ‘poème’ could not be communicated by Mojo in words. Being that the music is a strange, it will feel as though it is haunting your spirit and manipulating with your mind. Salvador Dali narrations will make you realize that this has a surrealist feel as well as being provocative and having a sensual melodic satire. It has a variety of unusual loops and dreadful lysergic ambiences.

Earlier in life, Luis Buñuel and Salvador Dali became friends in the late 1910’s prior to meeting while studying at the University of Madrid. A decade later in 1929, Both men were still in contact with one another and decided to work together on a short film called Un Chien Andalou. Buñuel eventually had a dream of a cloud slicing through the moon and a razor slicing through an eye repeatably. Nonetheless, Dalí also had weird dream like his friend. He dreamt of a human hand covered in ants. To me, both dreams seem to be disturbing and cringy. But, because of the dreams that they had, those two visuals were implemented into the film and put in place. As the collaboration went on, they both agreed to a principle that they will both work under, 'no idea or image that might lend itself to a rational explanation of any kind would be accepted.' This film rocked back and forth in between being a cinematic dream and cinematic nightmare.

That was not the only time Dali worked Buñuel. The second film that they produced together was L'Age d'Or. This film was performed in 1930 at Studio 28 in Paris. Salvador Dalí and José Montes-Baquer collaboration brought about this special broad media synthesis, for which they utilized a blend of true to life and autovisula systems. L'Age d’O is a bizarre romantic story of a couple, loaded with savagery, and dark humor, which is nothing less than expected of Salvador Dali. It begins as a narrative about scorpions and criticizes the common social circle and blames it for having caused the war; then finishes with an interpretation of a text of the Marquis de Sade. This film contains provocative pictures that are also repulsive and rebellious. The arrangement of images follows one after another, building up in the brains of the viewers so that they can link an immediate relationship between corruption and established order in a way. L'Age d'Or was 'banned for years after fascist and anti-Semitic groups staged a stink bomb and ink-throwing riot in the Paris theater where it was shown'.

In 1945, Salvador Dalí's received a call by his movie agent in regard to a film about a nightmare. Director Alfred Hitchcock is the man who wanted Dali to be a part of his team for this film. The film Spellbound is a psychoanalytic thriller made in 1945. It would make sense to include Dali's skills because off his surrealist style that he is so famous for throughout his paintings and he did not want the traditional blurred Hollywood dream sequence. Hitchcock stated that he did not hire him for the publicity value. The filmmaker stated in a 1962 interview, “I wanted Dalí because of the architectural sharpness of his work. I want to convey the dream with great visual sharpness and clarity, sharper than the film itself.” Dalí's scene comes at a pivotal moment and the sequence opens with Peck depicting his fantasy to Bergman. He says, 'I can't make out exactly what kind of a spot it was,' leaning back on the specialist's chaise as the shot disintegrates into Dalí's imagery. You can see eyes drifting in space in which change into painted shades. they are brutally destroyed by a man with a couple of gigantic scissors. Also, a scene depicts rocks that have faces, a Blackjack game with playing a game of cards and men that are faceless.

In the 20th century, two of the most iconic and influential people of that era met for the first time. Those two people are Salvador Dali and Walt Disney. For many, now including myself, this was a very Legendary moment in history. It was said that in 1944, the two met at a dinner party at the home of Jack Warner of Warner Bros. Dalí happened to be Warner’s house guest he worked with Alfred Hitchcock for the “Spellbound.” Film. Salvador Dalí and Walt Disney decided to collaborate and they both came up with the idea of creating a short film called “Destino”. Destino has photorealistic visuals and depicts the solitary love between a woman, Chronos and the personification exemplification of time. in the film, the woman moves and dances around a desertscape that transforms into a labyrinth while she slips into an astonishing dress. The way she carries herself grabs the attention of a man that seem inaccessible. Dalí disclosed the film to press as 'a magical exposition of the problem of life in the labyrinth of time.' Disney tried to separate his art-speak, saying it was 'only a straightforward story of a young woman looking for her genuine love.'Disney wanted and anticipating it being a short that he could squeeze into one of the prominent post-war 'bundle features' he made, such as Make Mine Music. Shockingly, their film took about 50 years to finish. This animated film was only six minutes and 40 seconds long. Dali began working on “Destino” in 1946 after their first meeting. Dalis contributions were creating 22 paintings along with more than 135 storyboards as well as drawings, and sketches. Disney's studio produced around 17-20 seconds of original animation that were based off of Dali’s thoughts and ideas. Fortunately, this was not the last that we have heard of Destino. Destino returns 58 years later during the re-arrival of fantasia in 2000. Walt Disney’s nephew Roy E. Disney took a risk at bringing back Dalí’s unique work of art for the unreleased venture. In secrecy, Roy E. Disney enrolled a group of illustrators and a director in France who could recreate their vision for $1.5 million. Being that changes had to be made, a couple of minutes were cut from the last form, coordinated by Dominique Monféry. The reason for this is so that he could to make a visually stunning 6-7 minute short that ended up landing them an Oscar nomination in 2003.

Impressions of Upper Mongolia - Homage to Raymond Roussel (1975) is another film that Salvador Dali has under his belt. Dali portrayed a story around scientific voyage to Upper Mongolia in search for giant psychedelic mushrooms. Dalí bases this imagery voyage around the story of a Mongol princess who forces her subjects to consume powdered mushrooms. The structure of the film is likewise verbalized by the music, by the story imagined particularly by Dali and by the sequence of dreamlike pictures derived from the metal piece of a fountain pen.[footnoteRef:14] This particular film is a tribute to the French author Raymond. He is respected by Surrealists and built up a formal framework with which to produce scholarly inspiration out of puns on words and the account references emerging from these. Dalí considered Roussel to be a forerunner of his paranoiac-basic strategy and as an expression of his appreciation imagined this imaginative and test work as a fabulous voyage through Upper Mongolia. Salvador Dalí and José Montes-Baquer collaboration brought about this special broad media sythesis, for which they utilized a blend of true to life and autovisula systems.

Lastly, Dali also worked with executive Alejandro Jodorowsky whom cast Dali in the role of the Padishah Emperor in a creation of Dune, in view of the novel by Frank Herbert in the mid-1970s. Jodorowsky met Dali in the King Cole Bar in the St. Regis inn in Manhattan to talk about the job. Dali and Jodorowsky conversed in regard to Dali’s interest in the film. Dali being the controlling person that he is, required a condition. His condition was that he wanted to appear as the highest compensated actor artist in Hollywood. Even though Jodorowsky wanted to slice Dali's screen time to insignificant number of minutes. He gave Dali a role as the head, promising him that he would be the most highly compensated actor on an every moment premise. Unfortunately, and funnily, the film was eventually never made.

It was very interesting learning about the ways in which Salvador Dali grew from focusing his life on art to then film. He worked with many people, created a few films, and stumbled across some obstacles because of his own ego. All in all, Dali got a taste of what it means to be a film maker and director. He got his feet wet by joining forces with other creators and doing collaborations that others would dream of. Also, he made a better name for himself by taking his talents to Hollywood. As stated, many people do not realize that Salvador Dali is the jack of all trades and does not stick to one talent; he dibbles and dabbles in a bit of everything. The way that Dali provokes the viewers mind in his artwork then in film is intriguing and makes you wonder what his images are really about. It also makes you think who or what is he going to work on next. Dali seemed as though he stayed true to himself and his artwork by knowing what he is capable of bringing to the table to film directors and Hollywood in general. He accomplished one goal after another and proving to be the crazy, talented, genius that he is.