The title of the film is a homage to Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels’ "Communist Manifesto", specifically a reference to the opening sentence: "A spectre is haunting Europe – the spectre of Communism" (in French, "spectre" is translated as "fantôme"). This sentence refers to the way in which the idea of Communism was being used pejoratively by the authorities in the mid-19th century to attack all political parties opposed to the established order (church, aristocracy and state). "The Communist Manifesto" was written to offer a positive vision of the views, aims and tendencies of Communists from across Europe. Buñuel and the Surrealists were closely linked to the Communists in the 1930s, but by the 1950s he had developed a greater antipathy towards the party.