Mourners share their memories of a dead film-star at her wake, a la Citizen Kane. Only melodrama.

In a small Mexican village the news shock neighbors, Ricardo Alfaro, a wealthy local rancher has disappeared without a trace. Taking advantage of the circumstance, Aurora Campos, a strong woman with overwhelming beauty, convinces the authorities to sell her the property in exchange for twelve thousand dollars. Soon after, when Ricardo suddenly reappears, a real battle is about to begin.

This typical Mexican melodrama is set in a coastal fishing village where a wealthy fisherman lives with his wife and young son. Their lives are turned upside down when an American of dubious morality comes into town. The American and the fisherman's wife had been lovers years and years ago -- and now the fisherman begins to suspect that the son he always thought was his, is really the offspring of this foreign intruder.

Young woman's fiance unexpectedly falls in love with her mom, and ends up arranging the young woman's death.

1970 film by Juan Ibáñez Díez-Gutiérrez

Independently-wealthy woman tries to break free of repressive, conservative cultural constraints.

1957 film

1948 film by Emilio Fernández

1950 film

Amid the Mexican Revolution, a woman rises from the depths of poverty and becomes a courtesan who is much-sought-after by high-society men, but she cannot forget her love for a rebel leader.

1959 film by Juan Antonio Bardem

1959 film by Ismael Rodríguez

1963 film directed by Roberto Rodríguez

Armendáriz was terrific in this. I won't repeat the praises from prior reviews, I concur. My only problem with this film is that it wasn't true to the revolution. In that sense, it was indeed a Fernandez film as neither was he true to the revolution. He gave a Cristero slant to the issues of Church/State and redistribution of wealth. Just take it as a love story set in the revolutionary period and try to ignore the political bias. Jeeze, you'd think he'd have shown more gratitude having been pardoned by Lázaro Cárdenas for his treason. Pedro Armendáriz, María Felix and the town of Cholula were the great stars of this film. The exteriors were certainly shot in Cholula. There were some snippets of revolutionary period music (La Adelita and El Tren) and an anachronistic performance of Malageña Salerosa when he had mariachi serenade María Felix. That song is so lovely, I didn't mind.

Maria Felix, the archetypical Mexican movie star, plays one of her bad/good girl roles, with elements of the characters played by Joan Crawford, Barbara Stanwyck and even Marlene Dietrich. (she sings a song by her then husband, the famous composer,Augustine Lara). Arturo de Cordova's tortured lover is reminiscent of his role in Buñuel's Exterminating Angel. There's some extraordinary photography , stylized sets (the furniture designer gets a credit) and outrageous dresses for La Doña, as Maria Felix is still known in Mexico. It's definitely one of the styles that Buñuel expanded in his early Mexican films like the 1955 "Ensayo de un crimen."

I have just seen this movie for the 12-15th time and I still find something extraordinarily fascinating every time I watch it. This movie is based on a novel by Venezuela's Romulo Gallegos one of Latin America best writer. The movie is so profound, because you can see so many aspects of the human being in it. You can find hate, witchcraft, religion, love, impotency and repentance, mainly because of the ignorance of people. This movie develops in the great Venezuela Savannahs, where the law of the stronger prevailed. The dialogs, so strong and captivating, are possible due to Gallegos very strong command of the Spanish Language and the slang of the peasants of that region. As I have mentioned before for a couple of other movies, this one is best appreciated if you understand Spanish. I may see it again another dozen times, and I am sure I would still enjoy it, as I hope you may too. This movie is officially rated as the 75th in importance in the Mexican Cinematography, to which I TOTALLY DISAGREE.

The president of Mexico has his country and people at heart, and he is looking for solutions. He knew that education is the key to making his country a better place, that's why he targeted the educators and gave them special assignments. This is where maria Felix shows that she has interest in her village Rio Escondido and her nation as well. This shows how teachers have are very influential or is necessary for the development of a nation and even those in authority knew that and invested in that. Nevertheless, even though there are people who want things to change there are people who will oppose these positive changes because they will not gain as much want as they want and probably loose some of their power because people have become aware of the injustice done to them like wise gain the ability to be on equal grounds with these unfair figures. This was the case of the selfish mean president of the municipal of Escondido. He recognized the talent of maria Felix and pretended he cared for the people and even her. This shows that we must be careful of people when the show certain changes quickly because they recognized talent , and don't fall for these changes but observe these person to make sure it was genuine changes , as in the case of the PM of the municipal , who did that because he liked maria Felix. Ultimately, because of his double standards she was able to complete her task of gaining means and methods of helping her country. This also tells us we can also learn from our mistakes and from the people who are doing injustices in our communities and because of these local experiences we are therefore able to help other communities and ultimately nations.