Can a cop with a heart of gold and a prostitute with a dented heart of gold
find happiness on the sordid streets of the Red Light district of Mexico
City in this black and white musical noir melodrama? Directed by Emilio Fernandez,
one of the great Mexican Golden Age directors and also as a curiosity the
model for the Oscar statuette, he creates a claustrophobic tiny world of
despair with the walls of fate slowly closing in on its protagonists. Prostitutes,
pimps, gangsters and cops dominate this landscape with only a sliver of light
leading to something better outside of it. Beautifully shot in black and
white that captures the imagery of the shadows overhanging everyone, the
long stairway that leads to tragedy, the dank dark streets and the squalid
short time hotel rooms. But into this picture of venality music and dance
constantly explodes bringing moments of joy and escape to the participants
- Mexican Danzon and African percussion beats are the soundtrack of their
lives.
Every night the Salon Mexico opens its doors and the girls slowly arrive
swinging their hips and flashing their eyes in hopes of finding companionship,
drinks, a tip, a twirl on the dance floor and possibly a trip across the
street to the dirty bed sheets that await. One of these women is Mercedes
(Marga Lopez) who we first spot entering a dance contest with Paco, who we
later learn is her pimp/boyfriend/dance partner. They win the 500 pesos which
she desperately needs but he takes it all and leaves her with the trophy.
He is a pimp after all with a few girls on the string. She sneaks into the
short time room where he and a girl lay across the bed in post-coital sleep
and steals the money. When she leaves she stupidly throws away his wallet
which is witnessed by the cop Lupe Lopez (Miguel Inclan) and this sets in
action the remainder of the film.
She is doing this work so that her younger sister can go to a good school
and marry into a good family. That is her simple dream. Only that. Then retire
from this business. But hiding secrets is not easy when you are on display
every night and your face is marked by the fists of men. If this film had
been made in Hollywood it would be up there with a lot of other well-respected
noirs, but being from Mexico is has disappeared. I read about it a few weeks
ago in a New York Times article that jogged my curiosity. I am glad it did.
It isn't great by any means but the milieu that it is set in was pretty interesting
for a 1949 film.
