If you are a cinema fan, and I tell you we've just seen a film by Luis Bunuel, you'll have a pretty good idea of what it is like - some surrealistic story with sexual, religious, and/or social themes. Gran Casino (1947) is nothing like that. It's a Mexican oilfield Western musical.
It starts in prison. Jorge Negrete and Julio Villarreal are locked up with some drunks, and the only person who can let them out is the mayor. And the mayor has gone to the oilfields, where there is money to be made, and probably won't be back. So Negrete strums a guitar and sings a ballad to cover the sound of the Villarreal sawing through the bars. Soon. they are on their way to the oilfields too.
There, they stop into the Gran Casino, where Agustín Isunza, a charming drunk, tells them they can work for his boss, Francisco Jambrina. The rich owner of the Casino has been keeping him from working his wells, to force him to sell out. Since Negrete is pretty tough, and Villarreal is an engineer, they start work.
Things are going well, when the boss disappears after going upstairs with a woman at the Casino. Then his sister appears, Libertad Lamarque - she plays an Argentine tango singer, as she was in real life. She suspects Negrete and co. of killing her brother to take over the field. So she gets a job singing at the Casino to do some investigating.
Of course, she will find out that Negrete is innocent and they will fall in love in the end. But not without a lot of peril, and many songs - and a few dance numbers.
If you like old Westerns, this should appeal, even though there are no horses, cows, or gunfights. If you like old-fashioned Mexican music, you'll love it. Remember de la Cruz, from Coco? Negrete is the type of guy he was modelled after (although not evil, I guess).
It seems Bunuel couldn't get his kind of movies funded, so he took this as work-for-hire in Mexico. He wasn't proud of it, and I guess it wouldn't make the film books. But as an adventure yarn with songs, it's great.
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