The Saragossa Manuscript is a 1965 film by Polish director Wojciech Has, based on The Manuscript Found in Saragossa by Jan Potocki, written in 1815.
The movie begins with the discovery of the titular manuscript by an army officer, who (in the middle of a battle) begins thumbing through it to admire the artwork. An enemy officer arrives, tries to arrest him, and gets drawn in as well. As it so happens, the book talks about his ancestor.
Alfonse van Worden, captain of the Spanish Walloon Guard, is attempting to reach Madrid over the mountains with his two servants. Warned of gypsies and ghosts, he resolves to proceed anyway. Along the way he is seduced, drugged, seduced again, drugged again, and told numerous stories, in which some of the characters begin telling stories of their own...
This film provides examples of the following tropes:
- Attack! Attack... Retreat! Retreat!: The army officer in the beginning starts an attack only to retreat immediately.
- Back from the Dead: The Zota brothers were hanged for being notorious bandits, but make an appearance in one of the stories. Somebody hanged a couple of random guys to appease the locals that something was being done."Do they, by chance, have the habit of coming down?"
"Very often, usually at night." - Blood from the Mouth: Toledo's friend who dies in a duel is shown with blood from his mouth when disclosed on the stretcher.
- The Church: The Spanish Inquisition plans to waylay Alfonse a couple of times. The first time, they succeed, and he's only rescued from the torture chambers by the Zota brothers. The second time, they manage to get Velasquez by mistake.
- Closed Circle: Alfonse seem to go be caught in a in closed circles between the gallows and the inn. The Spanish Inquisition acts as a Border Patrol, preventing him from getting on with his journey to Madrid.
- The Commandments: Gaspar Soarez gives his son Lopez a set of four strict instructions before sending him out into the world: do not associate with noblemen, do not use the title "Don", do not get into swordfights, and do not associate with the family of royal banker Moro. By the time Gaspar catches up with Lopez, he has broken all four commandments by associating with Don Roque Busqueros, who addresses him as "Don Lopez Soarez" and has fought a duel with him when Lopez interrupted his story about Frasquetta, and by seeking the hand of Moro's daughter Inez in marriage.
- Contemplate Our Navels: Don Pedro Velasquez entertains deep philosophical questions at the table which Alfonse admits to be unable to follow.
- Dead Person Conversation: Toledo's close friend dueled Toledo's own brother, and resolved to tell him the truth of the afterlife if he lost. What Toledo hears later that night during a thunderstorm makes him abandon his philandering ways and become a penitent. For a while.
- Demonic Possession: Pacheco suffers from this, until it's revealed that he's a Basque acrobat who's just playing along with the Sheik's plans.
- Dream Within a Dream: Implied to be the entire adventure of Alfonse, up until two foreign women invite him for dinner at the inn near the end.
- Duel to the Death: This being Spain, happens or is mentioned frequently. Alfonse's father, being an honorable sort, engaged in several. Don Avadoro reveals that he saw one of them happen, and Alfonse confirms it.
- Enter Stage Window: Used twice (on different windows), by Lopez and later Busqueros. The latter's entry is implied to happen in a house where the ladder may as well be a permanent fixture.
- Forgotten Framing Device: The film ends without returning to the primary level of the Nested Story, the one with the two opposing soldiers reading the manuscript.
- Framing Device: The Saragossa Manuscript itself.
- Hell Hotel: The not so deserted Venta Quemada.
- Impoverished Patrician: Don Avadoro refuses offers to become a servant, stating that he's a nobleman by birth and upbringing, a beggar by choice.
- In Love with Love: Lopez Soarez narrates that he is in love, but has no idea who or what is the object of his desire.
- Instant Sedation: The sip Alfonse takes from the skull goblet renders him unconscious immediately.
- It Was Here, I Swear!: Alfonse finds the manuscript at the Cabalist's castle but it is gone to his dismay when he returns to the room.
- Karma Houdini: Lopez Soarez's nobleman "friend" Busqueros, who eats his food, steals his letters, stabs him in the arm and then remonstrates him for interrupting a good story, but who gets full marks for effortlessly knocking down the elder Soarez' objections to his son marrying Inez.
- Kissing Cousins: The Moorish princesses claim to be this to Alfonse.
- The Matchmaker: Busqueros. Also, the Sheik.
- Maybe Magic, Maybe Mundane: A recurring theme in the stories.
- The princesses recoil in fear from a Christian relic. When called on this by Alfonse, they explain that they are Muslim.
- The very moment that Alfonse's father cries out that he'd sell his soul for water, a beautiful woman in dark dress appears and gives him some.
- Uzeda, the Kabbalist, offers to prove the truth of incantations and demons to Velasquez.
- Toledo thinks he hears a voice from the afterlife warning him of the existence of purgatory. It's actually Lopez Soarez, whom Don Roque guided to the wrong window in an attempt to win Inez Moro's hand.
- Merchant Prince: The senior Soarez's rival Moro, the royal banker.
- Mistaken Identity: The Spanish Inquisition mistakes Velasquez for Alfonse when Uzeda guides the latter along a different path through the mountains.
- Naïve Newcomer: Lopez Soarez, who is new in town. He was given several pieces of good advice from his father, and managed to screw up every one of them. His naivete leads him into the company of Busqueros and Inez.
- Nested Story: The movie in a nutshell. First, there's Alfonse's grandson and an enemy soldier discovering and reading the Saragossa Manuscript, and we flash back to his adventures trying to get through the mountains to Madrid. Midway through the first half of the film, Alfonse listens to Pacheco tell the story of his attraction to his stepmother's sister Inezilla. In the second half, we get a veritable matryoshka doll of nested stories as Alfonse listens to Avadoro tell him a story in which he visits an injured Lopez Soarez, whose story includes a meeting with Don Roque Busquero in which the latter tells him the story of his paramour, Donna Frasquetta Solero, who tells Don Roque the story of how she put the literal fear of God into her husband. The fact that at one point, we are seeing Alfonse listen to Avadoro tell a story about Lopez Soarez telling a story about Don Roque telling a story about Frasquetta telling a story is lampshaded by the other listeners; Velasquez likens it to dividing numbers into ever smaller quotients.
- Pinball Protagonist: Alfonse. Then again, 90% of the movie is someone telling him a story.
- Rewatch Bonus: The stories nested within Avadoro's tale in the second half of the film fit together in ways that become more apparent if you watch the film a second time (most obviously, you'll know ahead of time that Toledo's conversation with a "disembodied spirit" about purgatory is really with Lopez Soarez after the latter's botched attempt to serenade Inez Moro).
- Running Gag: Each time Lopez Soarez sits down to what he intends to be a solo dinner at the inn where he is staying, Don Roque shows up and begins helping himself to the contents of the platter in the centre of the table. By the third time, Lopez has given up trying to stop him.
- Secret Test of Character: The reason for pretty much everything that has happened to Alfonse, to see whether he's worthy of marrying the princesses. The Saragossa Manuscript held by the cabalist and noticed by Alfonse describes everything, including the ending.
- Separate Scene Storytelling: All stories told on-screen are depicted in images.
- Sexy Discretion Shot: The hero embraces two sisters sitting on a bed; the camera remains fixed as the characters sink down out of the frame.
- Tap on the Head: Alfonse gets knocked out when henchmen of the Spanish Inquisition hits him in the head with a light wooden club.
- Three-Way Sex: Not shown, but definitely stated to have happened to the captain.
- Unwanted Assistance: Lopez Soarez demands that Busqueros do this, to the extent of challenging him to a duel.
