Luna de miel en Puerto Rico* [Honeymoon in Puerto Rico] (Pakira Films International, 1966) Exec Prod: José Raúl Ramírez; Prod: Paquito Cordero; Co-Prod/Dir: Fernando Cortés; Scr: Fernando Cortés, Alfredo Varela [Jr.]; Story: Julio Porter, Fernando Cortés; Photo: Alex Phillips [Jr.]; Music Dir: Sergio Guerrero; Lucha Villa's Musical Numbers: Rubén Fuentes; Assoc Prod: José E. Pedreira; Prod Mgr: Arturo Correa; Film Ed: Carlos Savage Jr.; Lighting: Luis Ramos Urquidi; Camera Asst: Francisco Miró; Makeup: Nivea Solano; Sound Engin: José Raúl Ramírez; Music/Rec: Enrique Rodríguez; Sound Asst: Eliezer Nieves; Eastmancolor
* aka Luna de miel en condominio
Cast: Lucha Villa (Lupe Villa), Miguel Ángel Alvarez (Johnny "El Men"), Nestor Zavarce (Agente 04), Marina Baura (Irene), Héctor Cabrera [uncredited] (Porfirio Rubirola), Elín Ortiz, Mario Pabón, Paquito Cordero (Paquito), Gilda Galán (doña Cruz), Gilda Mirós (Mary), Soledad Acosta (Ana María Villa), Luis Lucio, Mapy Cortés (Mapy Cortés), Fernando Cortés (Fernando Cortés), Titín Alvarez, Efraín Barrios, Víctor Santos, Luis Alberto Martínez (Martínez, desk clerk?), Edgardo Gierbolini (Italian bar owner?), Félix Monclova, Nelson Banks (J.P. Morguen aka "Mr. Smith"), Myriam Escalera, José Hernández Sosa (Chacho), El Gran Combo, Julio Ángel (singer), Los Diamantes, Las Go-Go Girls, Tito Lara (singer), Combo Les Cavaliers, doña Felisa Rincón de Gautier (herself)
Notes: although Mexican sources and the East-West DVD give a 75-minute running time for this Puerto Rican-Mexican co-production, the actual movie is nearly 2 hours long (approximately 115 minutes on the DVD, slightly longer on the MDVC videotape). Unfortunately, while the first half of this film is a moderately entertaining--if routine--farce (complete with false identities, gender confusion, threats of infidelity and other familiar plot devices), the latter part of the picture degenerates into confusion and becomes over-loaded with musical numbers.
15 songs are listed in the opening credits (including 7 by the late Rafael Hernández), but not all of these are heard on the soundtrack. It's possible some of these were cut and/or some were only used as background music.
The cast of Luna de miel en Puerto Rico is mostly Puerto Rican (Lucha Villa and Soledad Acosta were the only Mexican performers, although Miguel Ángel Alvarez and of course Mapy and Fernando Cortés worked in Mexican cinema) and features a number of notable names. These include Elín Ortiz, who later became a TV producer and the husband of Charytín Goyco (he was also married to Iris Chacón); doña Felisa Rincón de Gautier, the mayor of San Juan, Puerto Rico for 22 years; Venezuelans Héctor Cabrera (unbilled for some reason) and Marina Baura; producer/actor Paquito Cordero (the nephew of Mapy Cortés); and tenor Edgardo Gierbolini. Also appearing in a supporting role is Nelson Banks, who may have been a former Armed Forces Radio staffer stationed in Puerto Rico.
Manuel, the manager of the (real-life) Hotel Condado Beach in San Juan, and his assistant Paquito decide to promote their establishment by offering free "honeymoons in Puerto Rico" to newlywed couples. Among the couples who arrive are:
a) Nuyorican hustler (he sells cans of "Puerto Rican Air"--made in Brooklyn--for $.25) Johnny "El Men" and his girlfriend, go-go dancer Mary. They only pretend to be married to get the free trip. While in San Juan, Johnny loses all of their money at the casino, tries to get Mary to "be friendly" with gringo writer Smith, then concocts a scheme whereby Mary claims to be the illegitimate daughter of producer Fernando Cortés.
b) Venezuelan actor Porifirio Rubirola (his name spoofs Dominican playboy Porifirio Rubirosa) and his wife Irene. Irene is frustrated because their marriage is never consummated due to Porfirio's various ills (bug bites, sunburn, dizziness, etc.).
c) Mexican sisters Lupe and Ana María. They are singers looking for their big break; Lupe pretends to be Ana María's husband. [Curiously, Lucha Villa had just made a Mexican movie in which she appears in drag, Los dos rivales, 1965.] Ana María flirts with Paquito, while Manuel finds himself strangely attracted to the charro Lupe.
d) a black couple from "the Congo" who wear African garb and speak in made-up gibberish.
e) Mapy and Fernando Cortés (more or less playing themselves), who are celebrating their 25th wedding anniversary and try to "replay" their wedding night in the same room at the Hotel Condado Beach. Unfortunately, Fernando passes out after eating too many oysters and lobsters (a scene repeated in Un nuevo modo de amar, 1967, also co-written by Alfredo Varela Jr., only in that case the groom dies!) and is unable to re-consummate his marriage.
Meanwhile, inept hotel detective Agent 04 (who wears a different disguise and costume in every scene) tries to keep track of the guests and is constantly on the lookout for "spies."
Johnny convinces Fernando that Mary is the older man's daughter. This upsets Mapy, who is then amenable to Porfirio's odd request that she pretend to be his mother (!). Irene, neglected by her husband, flirts with Lupe, who is uncomfortable pretending to be a man (but, despite her disguise, isn't hesitant about showing her attraction to Manuel!). Someone steals Mapy's jewels from the hotel's security box. Journalist Mr. Smith is abducted and his real identity revealed: he's millionaire publisher J.P. Morguen [sic], who was writing a series of sensational articles on Puerto Rico.
Johnny and Mary visit her mother, doña Cruz, in a rural area. Johnny tries to get the woman to collaborate with their scheme to fleece Fernando, but she is outraged. Johnny begins to have second thoughts about the plot. He tells doña Cruz's ward Chacho that he was born on the island but moved to New York as a little boy (Johnny speaks a repetitive mix of Spanish and English throughout the movie).
Two FBI agents, investigating the Morguen kidnaping, interrogate Porfirio, who is now in the hospital after a water-skiing accident. He admits he faked his marriage to Irene so he could leave Venezuela for Puerto Rico: he was a former member of the PPPA, a "radical" political group but has now seen the error of his ways. He and Irene reconcile. Meanwhile, Mapy informs Fernando that they are expected to appear at that evening's ceremony in honor of the late Rafael Hernández (who died in December 1965, so presumably this is the one-year anniversary of the composer's death). Mary and Johnny are married (for real) in a church.
At the homenaje to Rafael Hernández that night (in the hotel's nightclub), Johnny and Mary explain the truth to Mapy and Fernando. Porfirio also confesses that he pretended to be Mapy's "son" so he could meet Fernando and ask for work as an actor in Puerto Rico. J.P. Morguen shows up with two jíbaros (Puerto Rican campesinos): hired by the kidnapers to bring them food at their hideout, the two men realized they were working for criminals and helped free Morguen and arrest the men. Morguen makes a speech and tears up the "negative" articles he had written about Puerto Rico. "These jibaros, like all campesinos of Latin America, represent the soul of this blessed land."
Mapy Cortés, the Gran Combo, Porfirio, Mary and Johnny, then Lupe (now revealed to be a woman) and Ana María all perform musical numbers in honor of Rafael Hernández. As the film concludes, Tito Lara reprises the title song.
Luna de miel en Puerto Rico is really too long but it does contain a few bits of witty dialogue and some curious socio-political references. For example, when Irene is dancing with Lupe, she asks "him"--"Do you lift weights?" Lupe replies, "No, why?" Irene: "You have a very ample chest." Earlier, when Mapy and Fernando first arrive at the hotel, they are told there are no vacancies due to the free-honeymoon promotion.
Fernando: "Honeymoon promotion? And birth control, what of that?"
Paquito: "The hotel, like the Ecumenical Council, is against that control. The Lord said, go forth and multiply."
The Smith/Morguen sub-plot is unclear. Smith is seen furiously typing away on his "exposé," but the inference is that his unpleasant experiences at the hotel (he was bumped from his room so Mapy and Fernando could spend their second honeymoon there) is the reason. However, when he makes his speech at the end, he indicates his articles were critical of Puerto Rico's political situation, which was never really mentioned before. Porifirio's membership in the PPPA (Partido Popular Progresista of something) is also a curious point. Porfirio says "isms" prey on impressionable young people and "once you are in, it's difficult to get out," but this is very vague.
The couple from the "Congo" are depicted in alternately racist and favorable ways. At first, they only speak in faux-African gibberish, but later reveal that they speak and understand Spanish, thus making a fool out of Agent 04, who has been insulting them! They're apparently secret agents of some sort (again not made clear) but are a real couple: as the movie concludes, all of the couples retire to their rooms but the light stays on in one room. Agent 04 says, "that's the Congo couple, if they turn off the light, they can't see each other."
Although there are sequences set in New York City and Mexico, these were clearly shot in Puerto Rico: New York is represented by some stock footage (the Statue of Liberty, aerial views of the skyscrapers) and a go-go bar set, while the Mexican scene takes place entirely in a cantina.
Nuyorican Johnny is portrayed in a rather negative fashion: he's a money-hungry hustler who speaks Spanglish, dresses in an odd fashion, and in one scene sprinkles "toilet water" on himself in lieu of a bath in cold water (and later blames the odor on Mary's "cheap perfume"). There are also rather more gringos (or "americanos" as they're called here) in the film than usual: in addition to "Smith" (Morguen)--who speaks fairly good Spanish--there are the FBI agents (who speak stilted Spanish) and even a fake tourist (one of Agent 04's disguises) complete with flowered shirt, sunglasses, and a camera. He asks to take a photo of desk clerk Martínez as a "typical Puerto Rican," but not only does Martínez instantly recognize him as the hotel detective, the clerk mutters "I'm Uruguayan."
Note on sources: this has recently been released by East-West on DVD, as Luna de miel en Puerto Rico. At about the 90-minute mark, the picture "freezes" for an instant and then the movie resumes for about 25 more minutes. The Million Dollar Video Corporation videotape from the late 1980s has the title Luna de miel en condominio on the box (along with misleading art and text which makes it appear to be a romantic thriller!) but the film itself has the identical Luna de miel en Puerto Rico title. As mentioned above, the videotape seems to be marginally longer than the DVD version, but I did not run a side-by-side comparison to determine what (if anything) differs in their content.
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