Critics reviews

This tale of heated passions and broken dreams was noticeably compromised by an insufferable shooting schedule... More troublesome, though, was Signoret... [Her] frenzy becomes her character’s, enervating an otherwise humdrum melodrama.

The first half is a reminder of Buñuel's admiration for "The Treasure of the Sierra Madre" while the second half, splendidly scored to squeaking birdcalls and simian chattering, amply showcases his improvements on it. "The Exterminating Angel" runs with the disintegration-restoration structure, Herzog's inspirations for "Aguirre: The Wrath of God" are visible throughout.

[The film] was obviously designed as escapist entertainment, but in the hands of director Luis Bunuel it becomes a little more than that. As things get curiouser and curiouser, it's interesting to see how close Bunuel's surrealist vision is to the expected extravagancies of genre filmmaking. No masterpiece, but a prime example of subversive cinema.

A subterfuge film from Luis Buñuel, in which his particular style and political views are subsumed within genre trappings. This is largely an exotic adventure... Yet by the time their adventure comes to a pitilessly ironic end, there is no doubt that this is the work of Buñuel.

"Death in the Garden" is full of marvelous, uniquely Buñuelian moments set in a melodramatic custard. It's not a film by which to be introduced to Buñuel, but if you know and appreciate his work as I do, it's one of the few movies around that should not be missed.

...The animal theme that we find again in The Brute as well as in Death in the Garden (the stunning fauna in the jungle, the boa constrictor, the cat, the plane, etc.) and all the other Mexican and French films is charged with a terrible meaning. The animal – a soulless being that strolls through events and things of the universe without understanding anything – singularly recalls the contradictions of our own existence.