Netflix: “Reluctantly becomes a prostitute…”

M EL suggested we review Aventurera, a Mexican 1950s cabaretera film. Unfamiliar with the genre or the director and faced with an email that said little more than “possible film for Anvil & Sprocket?” all I had to go on was the Netflix synopsis. Which reads:

[T]his engaging story follows a young, stunning exotic dancer (Ninon Sevilla) who reluctantly becomes a prostitute after suffering from deep depression when her father dies. Although her dismal vocation doesn’t leave her with much hope, that all changes when she meets and falls in love with an attractive man with a secretive history.

Wow, that sounds cheering, doesn’t it? Fortunately, the blurb writer for Netflix must have been watching another movie. In the first few minutes of Aventurera, rich-girl Elana (Ninón Sevilla) catches her severe and prudish mother in the arms of another man. When her father finds out, he commits suicide, and Elena is left on her own. Her shady friend Lucio promises her a job as a lady’s secretary in Juarez, but instead gets her drunk and sells her into prostitution at a cabaretera/whore house. Elana is less than appreciative of the opportunity afforded her there, escapes, and then plots revenge against the madame of the whorehouse.

OK, I give up. What is that on your ear?

I don’t want you to get the wrong idea: if this were 2006 and the film was directed by Quentin Tarantino ( an attractive idea for a remake, actually), said revenge might involve gallons of blood, Christopher Walken, and a monologue on Chiquita bananas. But this is 1950, so Elana’s plot is more psychological. And even that makes it sound more than it is — Aventurera is melodrama and has more in common with old gothic novels than it does modern-day thrillers. It has the kind of mid-1950s aesthetic that will have you half-expecting a Camel spokesman to pontificate on the effect of cigarettes on your T-zone.[1] And if you ever wondered what Carol Burnett would be like in a (overly) dramatic role, Ninón Sevilla is a fair approximation.

¹ That’s “T” for taste and “T” for throat.

The movie has quite a few music and dance numbers, two of which apparently take place on a TARDIS stage — somehow, a massive set is shoehorned into a tiny caberet. One of these numbers, “In a Persian Market,” features filmy dresses and barely-contained erotic dancing that had to have been just on the edge of what American censors would have tolerated. The other, a samba complete with not one but two fruit hats, starts with a “ziga-ziga” chorus that reminded me uncomfortably of the Spice Girls, but ended as a fun song about Josephine Baker.

Ninón Sevilla proves she’s a real actress by keeping a straight face wearing that hat.

Not all of musical interludes are diversions, though — the title song is sung twice, once towards the beginning of the film, and then later at the end; despite the lyrics being the same both times, it’s very affecting but for different reasons.

The repetition helps tie the movie together, too — and it’s a necessary effort. The film starts in Chihuahua, moves on to Ciudad Juarez, then to Mexico City, then Quadalahara, then back to Juarez, then … well, these places are just names to me, so I lost track. Major characters are introduced late in the film as well, which makes it all the more confusing. Aventurera is no simple story — it shares that, too, with the old gothic novels.

But the pacing is kept tight and Sevilla is a strong and sympathetic character, even if you find it harder to like her as the film goes on. It’s camp and melodrama, but it’s fun to watch. The themes are even modern, even if the film is pushing sixty. I’m glad M E-L recommended it to me, and if the premise appeals to you — the real one, not the Netflix approximation of an approximation of a synopsis — then I feel I can recommend it to you, too.

Elana is not looking at what you think she is looking at.