Cast:
Julio Alemán (Carlos Sandoval), Kitty
de Hoyos (Ana María Rivas), Marta
Romero (Marta Núñez), Pedro
Armendáriz Jr. (Arturo Solano),
Susana Cabrera (Lupe), Braulio
Castillo (prosecutor), Orlando
Rodríguez (judge), José de San Antón
(Lic. Cáceres), Efraín López Neris (?Freddy), Delia Esther Quiñones, Víctor
Santini, José Manuel Caicoya, Luis Alberto Martínez, William Agosto, Eva Alers,
Reinaldo Medina, José Hernández Zamora, Juan Batista, Vicky Sanz
Notes:
although Jerónimo Mitchell Meléndez had worked with Mexican performers before, Amor perdóname was his only Mexican
co-production. [Although no Mexican
company is credited, the number of Mexican performers and the fact that some
scenes were shot in Mexico is the tip-off.] Amor perdóname is a routine
melodrama that changes to a legal drama in the final section and is fairly
entertaining.
Businessman Carlos meets Ana María in a
Mexico City nightclub where Marta Núñez is performing. Carlos, although born in Mexico, has been a
resident of Puerto Rico for a number of years and is acquainted with
Marta. He escorts Ana María home, and
makes a date for the next day. Ana María
is actually a prostitute whose pimp, Arturo, thinks Carlos would be a good
client, and urges her to be "nice" to him while Arturo is away on a
trip. Carlos and Ana María fall in love,
and he proposes marriage to her, indicating he must return to Puerto Rico
soon. She turns him down but changes her
mind on the advice of her maid Lupe.
"San Juan, Puerto Rico. One year later." Ana María gives birth to a son; she and
Carlos are a happy couple, and he brings Lupe from Mexico to be his wife's
companion. They are invited to a party
at the home of Marta Núñez, who has remarried--Ana María is stunned to see Arturo
is the singer's new husband! Arturo
begins to blackmail Ana María, who asks for Carlos for money under false
pretenses. Meanwhile, Marta suspects
Arturo is unfaithful to her. Desperate
to keep his affections, she asks Carlos to allow her to purchase a radio
station he has an option on, so Arturo can run it. Carlos is reluctant to give up his dream of a
powerful chain of radio stations.
Arturo decides to leave Marta and
demands $100,000 from Ana María as one final payment. If she lacks the cash, she can arrange for
her jewels to be "stolen" by him. Ana María threatens to shoot herself (with a pistol she took from
Carlos' desk), but Arturo wrests the pistol away from her. Later, Arturo tells Marta he never loved her
and is going away forever.
That night, Carlos catches a shadowy intruder in the house. They struggle, and someone shoots the burglar
to death: it is Arturo! Carlos, who did not
fire the fatal shots, shoots his pistol twice into a potted plant, then calls
his lawyer and confesses to the killing. He claims self defense, but the prosecution decides to charge him with
murder. Despite his lawyer's pleas,
Carlos refuses to let Ana María testify. Marta does take the stand and denies her marriage was in trouble. Carlos' attorney learns Carlos owned two
identical pistols, and the bullets that killed Arturo were not from the
gun he turned in. The prosecution claims
this proves the shooting was premeditated murder. However, Ana María takes the stand and tells
her story, admitting she was seduced into prostitution by Arturo, then
blackmailed by him. She says Arturo took
away the pistol she had, and she didn't shoot him. The prosecution claims she's trying to cover
for Carlos.
However, the defense proves Marta had
hired a private detective to shadow Arturo. Marta is recalled to the stand and confesses everything: she stole the
pistol from Arturo and followed him to the home of Carlos and Ana María, where
she killed him as he fought with Carlos.
Ana María prepares to leave Puerto Rico,
believing Carlos no longer loves her. However, he admits he knew of her past all along, and loves her
anyway. They reconcile.
The final part of Amor perdóname provides an interesting twist on the standard
melodrama formula (albeit not a unique one, since films like 1950's Amor vendido and La mujer X in 1954-the latter based on the oft-filmed play
"Madame X"--featured climactic murder trials), even if some of the
legal procedures are a bit shaky. For
example, it's the middle of the trial before anyone thinks to test the
bullets that killed Arturo see if they were fired by Carlos (to be fair, he did
confess to the shooting, but still...). This revelation inspires the prosecutor to change the charge against
Carlos from homicida calificado
(presumably something like second-degree murder) to premeditated murder. It is neat, however, that Ana María's big
confession basically counts for nothing: the prosecutor dismisses it as an
attempt to exonerate Carlos. Only when
Marta, in tried-and-true "Perry Mason" fashion, completely breaks
down on the witness stand and confesses everything is justice served.
The performances in Amor perdóname are pretty good, overall. Marta Romero gets a lot of attention--some
big dramatic scenes, a couple of songs--and Pedro Armendáriz Jr. is splendidly
evil, which leaves Julio Alemán and Kitty de Hoyos looking a little bland.
Susana Cabrera is her usual acerbic self, and the Puerto Rican supporting
players are fine. The production values
are adequate. Curiously, the scenes in
Mexico City are not at all distinctive and could easily have been filmed in
Puerto Rico; the Puerto Rican
footage--aside from a brief "travelogue" sequence showing various
imposing buildings (prominently flying the U.S. and Puerto Rican flags)--is
also confined to some anonymous looking buildings and exteriors, not exactly
making full use of the island as a movie location.