''Humo en los ojos'' (''Smoke in the Eyes'') is a Mexican drama film directed by Alberto Gout. It was released in 1946 and starring

Meche Barba Meche Barba (born Mercedes Barba Feito; September 24, 1922 – January 14, 2000) was an American-born Mexican film actress and dancer of the Golden age of Mexican cinema in the 1940s and 1950s. She was considered one of the icons of the "Rumbera ...

and David Silva. The film is in the public domain in both Mexico and the United States.

Plot

Maria Esther (

) is a young girl that works as a dancer in a cabaret. María Esther falls in love with Carlos (David Silva), a sailor who had a previous relationship with a cabaret woman named Sofia (

María Luisa Zea María Luisa Zea (5 February 1913 – 27 December 2002) was a Mexican actress and singer of the Golden Age of Mexican cinema. In her career spanning 24 years, she appeared in over 50 motion pictures. Selected filmography *'' La Llorona'' (193 ...

). A rivalry erupts between the two women. Neither of the two realizes that, in reality, they are mother and daughter.

Cast

... ''María Esther'' * David Silva ... ''Carlos'' *

... ''Sofía'' * Rubén Rojo ... ''Juan Manuel'' * Fernando Soto "Mantequilla" ... ''Chon'' * Toña la Negra ... ''Toña''

Reviews

The plot was inspired by the same named song of Agustín Lara, who brought other tropical themes along with Juan Bruno Tarraza and Rafael Hernández Marín. One of the classic films of the

Rumberas film The Rumberas film (in Spanish, Cine de rumberas) was a film genre that flourished in Mexico, in the so-called Golden Age of Mexican cinema in the 1940s and 1950s. Its main stars were the so-called '' rumberas'', dancers of Afro-Caribbean musical rh ...

is ''Humo en los ojos''. In his essential and delicious ''Documentary History of Mexican cinema'', the researcher Emilio García Riera writes the following comment: ''It's funny the outcome of this tropical melodrama. David Silva feels incestuous by simple solidarity with her former lover Maria Luisa Zea and that makes him give up of a Meche Barba more "femme fatal" than ever. In the microcosm of the tropical cabaret, the director Alberto Gout discovered how the passions tragically collide with the revelations of kinship. At the same time, Gout was finding, for him and for the genre of Rumberas, the style that would give prosperity in the coming years''.''Películas Pepito: Humo en los ojos (1946)''
/ref> The film was originally offered to the Cuban-Mexican rumbera

María Antonieta Pons Maria Antonieta Pons (November 6, 1922 in Havana, Cuba – August 20, 2004 in Mexico City) was a Cuban-born Mexican film actress and dancer. She was the first actress in the ''Rumberas films'' in the 1940s and 1950s, in the Golden Age of Mexican ...

. As the producer(s) and Pons did not reach a salary agreement, the producer Alfonso Rosas Priego and the director Alberto Gout began to test several other candidates. Among them were Lupita Torrentera, Yadira Jimenez and Ethel Maklen, but eventually Meche Barba was chosen. Thanks to this film, Barba makes her foray into Rumbera films.

References

External links

* 1946 films Mexican black-and-white films Rumberas films 1940s Spanish-language films Mexican drama films 1946 drama films Films directed by Alberto Gout 1940s Mexican films {{1940s-Mexico-film-stub