La Llorona (1933)

 

To Weep,
Perchance To Die

La Llorona
Directed by Ramón Peón
Mexico 1933
Indicator UK Blu Ray

Before this movie, the only film I’d consciously seen which was overtly based on the Mexican folk horror tales of La Llorona - aka The Weeping Woman - aka The Crying Woman or any other variant translations - was the 2019 American made movie set in The Conjuring universe (The Curse Of La Lorona, reviewed by me here). However, I soon became aware that there is a rich cinematic legacy of films made from or inspired by these stories and so I figured I’d lift the lid at some point. And that begins now with this recent (at time of writing, although I left it too late to get the slipcase edition... a shame as I’d actually have liked to read the printed booklet on this one) release from Indicator of what is widely known as the very first horror talkie made in Mexico (as opposed to other latino versions made in America of early talkies such as the much loved Spanish language version of Dracula... reviewed by me as part of a this article here).

Now, I have to say that it barely scrapes by as a horror movie in my book, due to the flashback interpretive nature of large portions of it, which render the central myth as something not to be taken without a pinch of salt... but the very last few shots of the movie do, I would say, tip it into the realm of a good old supernatural horror story so, yeah, first Mexican horror talkie it is. 

It’s also, in equal parts, fairly charming and quite sinister in tone, I would say. Seeing it now for the first time, I was surprised how much the visual and audio syntax of early American cinema had already transcended the USA and into other film cultures but, this is perhaps not so surprising since a) the director had some early training in Hollywood and b) a lot of Mexican film technicians and actors had returned from working on Hollywood movies and brought a lot of technical know how back to Mexico with them. Mexican cinema was booming with 21 films apparently made in 1933, as opposed to just over a handful the previous year. 

The film is set in three time periods... contemporary times to when it was shot, plus sometime during the colonial period and then another time during the era when the conquistadors rolled up on the Aztec empire. The two older time periods take place in extended flashback sequences when two different books tell what seem to be two different variants of the La Llorona story and, almost like the writers wanted to have their cake and eat it, both of these have been shoehorned into the story in a way that... I have to admit... I couldn’t quite understand and was left a little confused by, in terms of the curse that befalls the central family in the modern setting of the film. Neither of these versions of the story, though, features the drowning of the children at their heart and, instead, children are knifed to death in the chest. 

The film starts strongly with a man walking the streets of Mexico in the night and, upon hearing the wailing of the weeping woman, he dies of a heart attack. We then meet the family of one of the doctors who performs his autopsy and then his son has his four years old birthday party. Alas, he then finds out the first born of each generation of his family have gone missing on their fourth birthday, only to turn up days later dead... with a dagger in the chest. Meanwhile, as the grandfather of the family tells the first story leading to the flashback, a sinister figure in black robes reminiscent of an ebony variant of a Klu Klux Klan costume is watching and spying on the family... later going for the son, twice, in order to carry on acting out the curse of La Llorona. 

And it’s great. Right from the outset, as the credits were rolling, I was charmed by the fact that I was watching a movie from a time and culture that, before the actors were even mentioned, an important credit was “The furniture in this film was specially made by...”. I mean, get your product placement in first, I guess.

It’s also not an unsophisticated film, with a fair amount of moving camera and also a lot of movement from people within the static shots too. There are some nice shot designs, such as a sword fight between two men being looked down on through the struts of a balcony, the vertical bar separating and framing the duellists. And when a character called Dõna Ana stabs her four year old son to death before stabbing herself on the same balcony, falling back into her room, there’s a nice series of shots of her ghost getting up from her body and flying through the window wailing. This is followed by two more similar ghost effects from two different characters... the last of which doesn’t take place in flashback and, due to the startled onlookers, cements the movie as definitely being a horror film rather than just a thriller, as far as I’m concerned. 

Perhaps due to the differences between the US and Mexican culture (although the Hays Code didn’t come into proper enforcement in the US until 1934, so maybe I’m being a little naive here) the film pulls no punches. Both in the depiction... or at least implied moments... of child death by stabbing and, also, in the pools of flowing blood left behind with some of the adult victims of the character who is responsible for the killings in the contemporary sections of the film... who I’m guessing you’ll spot a mile off, even with the inclusion of a kind of ‘red herring’ character. 

So yeah, I really enjoyed this. But not as much as the absolutely brilliant extras. Indicator hasn’t managed to include as much as their usual plethora of special features but what is here is quality. Especially a wonderful 20 minute featurette called La Llorona: Ghosts Of The Past by Viviana García Besné, the great granddaughter of the films producer who was partially responsible for saving and restoring the last, badly damaged print of this film. It includes lots of really interesting facts about the movie and its origins and includes some home movie footage from both then and now which... well... let’s just say I found myself unexpectedly moved to tears as much as I was informed by this one. 

Secondly, there’s another great extra called Transcending Time, with Castillo Flores, head programmer of the Mórbido Film Fest, who looks at the origins of the La Llorona myth and its various incarnations in Mexican movies. He also mentions that the Americans have made a lot of versions themselves but, in a telling moment, he says he’d rather not speak about those ones. But he does have fascinating stories about the various origins and variations of the mythos and also, some nice stories from the filming of this version. For example, that balcony suicide scene? The actress in question was so into her role and the scene that she forgot the entire building was just a constructed front section with no actual room behind it. She flung herself backwards after her stabbing, into the room... forgetting there was no actual room (it was obviously in a different part of the studio) and would have plunged to her death had her expensive dress not go caught on part of the frame and saved her from falling. So, yeah, interesting anecdotes all round on the extras.

All in all, LaLorona is a really great Blu Ray edition of a film I might never have had the opportunity to see, had it not been for the heart felt efforts of Viviana García Besné and I’m really greatful to her and her partners in crime for making this available again after so many decades have elapsed. Definitely a must see for lovers of early horror movies and, heck, I sure wish I’d bought that slip case edition now.