With a friend being a big fan of auteur film maker Luis Buñuel,I started to search round for an overlooked Buñuel title that he could watch during the Christmas period.Taking a look at a site featuring rare DVDs,I was shocked to discover that Buñuel had directed a "Women's picture!"which led to me getting ready to enter Guzmán nightclub:Le Inferno.
The plot:
Returning home after his business trip is cancelled thanks to a landslide blocking the train tracks, Quintín Guzmán finds his wife in bed with her secret lover.Getting into an argument as their baby daughter cries in the background,Guzmán wife gives him the happy news that the baby is not his! Wanting to hit his wife where it hurts, Guzmán takes the baby,and leaves her outside,with a plan to never tell his wife about the child's location.
Years later:
Raising her as their own daughter (whilst receiving child support from an anonymous donor) Martha finds her life to be one filled with dreams & struggles,as Martha's step-sister dreams of becoming a movie star,whilst her dad gives each of the family members regular beatings (which ends up killing Martha's mum.)Since his wife's lie over him not being Martha's dad, Quintín Guzmán has transformed himself into a ruthless gangster,who along with running the city's leading night club,also has 2 loyal henchmen, who do all of Guzmán's dirty work.After giving his wife the cold shoulder for the last few years, Guzmán is told by a priest that he must talk to his servilely ill ex-wife,due to their being something extremely important that she wants to tell him.Talking to his ex-wife, Guzmán discovers that Martha is actually his daughter.Desperate to be reunited with his daughter, Guzmán sets off to meet Martha for the first time in years.
View on the film:
Keeping their adaptation of Carlos Arniches & Antonio Estremera play Don Quintín el Armargao o El que siembra vientos... at a brisk 78 minute running time,the screenplay by Luis Alcoriza and Janet Alcoriza moves along at a break-neck speed,as the writers go from showing Guzmán to be a hapless businessman,to Guzmán being in control of the city's gambling and night club underworld.Whilst the writers never give a full satisfactory answer as to how Guzmán decided who would be Martha's step-parents,the writers make the flaw one that is very easy to overlook,thanks to them blending Martha's "Women's picture" smooth melodrama with delightful Screwball Comedy brush-strokes which help to give the title an unexpected light 'n' fluffy atmosphere,due to every fight that Martha has with her step- dad,being matched by Guzmán exploding over any situation which does not go his way.
Backed by an elegant score from Manuel Esperón,director Luis Buñuel dives deep into the movies comedic melodrama,with Buñuel revealing a sharp stylish eye,by displaying the passage of time in Martha's life in a dazzling minimalist manner.Cutting into the films comedic edge, Buñuel brilliantly uses whip-pans to keep the Screwball Comedy mood bursting with energy,as Guzmán gets set to be reunited with the daughter of deceit.
The plot:
Returning home after his business trip is cancelled thanks to a landslide blocking the train tracks, Quintín Guzmán finds his wife in bed with her secret lover.Getting into an argument as their baby daughter cries in the background,Guzmán wife gives him the happy news that the baby is not his! Wanting to hit his wife where it hurts, Guzmán takes the baby,and leaves her outside,with a plan to never tell his wife about the child's location.
Years later:
Raising her as their own daughter (whilst receiving child support from an anonymous donor) Martha finds her life to be one filled with dreams & struggles,as Martha's step-sister dreams of becoming a movie star,whilst her dad gives each of the family members regular beatings (which ends up killing Martha's mum.)Since his wife's lie over him not being Martha's dad, Quintín Guzmán has transformed himself into a ruthless gangster,who along with running the city's leading night club,also has 2 loyal henchmen, who do all of Guzmán's dirty work.After giving his wife the cold shoulder for the last few years, Guzmán is told by a priest that he must talk to his servilely ill ex-wife,due to their being something extremely important that she wants to tell him.Talking to his ex-wife, Guzmán discovers that Martha is actually his daughter.Desperate to be reunited with his daughter, Guzmán sets off to meet Martha for the first time in years.
View on the film:
Keeping their adaptation of Carlos Arniches & Antonio Estremera play Don Quintín el Armargao o El que siembra vientos... at a brisk 78 minute running time,the screenplay by Luis Alcoriza and Janet Alcoriza moves along at a break-neck speed,as the writers go from showing Guzmán to be a hapless businessman,to Guzmán being in control of the city's gambling and night club underworld.Whilst the writers never give a full satisfactory answer as to how Guzmán decided who would be Martha's step-parents,the writers make the flaw one that is very easy to overlook,thanks to them blending Martha's "Women's picture" smooth melodrama with delightful Screwball Comedy brush-strokes which help to give the title an unexpected light 'n' fluffy atmosphere,due to every fight that Martha has with her step- dad,being matched by Guzmán exploding over any situation which does not go his way.
Backed by an elegant score from Manuel Esperón,director Luis Buñuel dives deep into the movies comedic melodrama,with Buñuel revealing a sharp stylish eye,by displaying the passage of time in Martha's life in a dazzling minimalist manner.Cutting into the films comedic edge, Buñuel brilliantly uses whip-pans to keep the Screwball Comedy mood bursting with energy,as Guzmán gets set to be reunited with the daughter of deceit.