Excelent film, but to say this is the "true history" is a slight exaggeration, there being very little documentation (and that skewered by the journalism of the era) about the event or the supposed "club of 42". While the incident was and is well remembered here in Mexico, how much is the "real truth" and how much is speculation (we don't know that Ignancio de la Torre was actually at the dance, although his sexuality was well established... fun fact, because Emilio Zapata was one of de la Torre's more important employees -- his horse trainer -- Zapata was "smeared" by his opponents as an allegedly gay man). That de la Torre was a self-indulgent elitist snob and oppresive member of the Mexican "one percent"... as were the other 41... had the unfortunate side effect of perpetuating the stereotype of gay men as a bunch of rich cross-dressing hedonists.
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richmx2-957-86646413 May 2021
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summersun-9320014 May 2021Being lgbtq+ couldn't have been easy in the 19th century, and the price these men had to pay for their attempt at living their true lives was high. This film was, like it's name suggests, like a dance. Beautifully filmed, emotional, and very tragic.
My sympathies are on everyone's side in the story. Initially, I felt most for the wife, she wasn't treated fairly. But the faith of Ignacius and Everisto was equally, if not more, tragic. As sad the story was for the people involved, this story is a part of the lgbtq+ history, and I'm glad that it is now beautifully told. -
zhivago9714 July 2021I found this movie to be engaging, interesting and well paced throughout. Although it's a fairly straightforward storyline lacking major surprises, there is enough plot activity and character development happening to keep you wondering what might happen next.
You can probably guess the ending, and I won't spoil it. But I think the more important thing is that a movie like this, based on historical context, took such a long time to be made. In theory, this story from early 1900s could have been made in 1948 or 1967 or another random year, but the theme is so taboo, not only for audiences, but for the actors, studios (etc) that it was not possible to make this film much sooner. Apparently it had a long lasting cultural impact in Mexico, even though the "scandal" occurred over a hundred years ago.
The acting is strong. The pain each character displays is palpable. One can't help but feel sorry for the protagonist and his long-suffering wife, both of whom are equally confused, angry and fearful. They are on the opposite sides of the same coin. Both display moments of strength and courage while dealing with their pain.
The theme of being closeted, publicly outed, and humiliated happens today, in big and small ways, all over the world. While one does not need to have an "activist" mindset to appreciate this movie, the pain displayed and sense of unfairness (for everyone) will likely stir emotion in most viewers! I don't necessarily mean tears, I mean it forces one to think about ones own feelings about this topic. Maybe that was the point of the movie. -
ops-5253513 May 2021Production showing the era of time in excellent cosumes and location designs. Its a story from the true history, a landmark for the 19th century and maybe todays lgbtq+ soscieties of the world, it happens in mexico, where gender is highly regulated by the catholic church as men and woman, and everything else is a devilish sin. A lodge of common gentlemen is made, but such secrets cant live a life being sensed by the outside world, that is the story, and it includes the highest ranks of mexican high society like a royal frog kiss.
Its a provoking and revealing historic piece of silverscreen art, a must see for some, a reserved recommend from the grumpy old man though. -
josantoddi8 September 2021An interesting film. I'm left wondering how true it was to the real story upon which it was based.
I found some of the portrayals of gay men rather cliché. And while the gay men in the film had my sympathy, I couldn't help feeling equally sorry for all the women who've suffered as beards through the Ages. Used. Deceived. Unloved. Betrayed. Wasted on men that didn't really want to be married to them.
This film left me confused & sad. I'm grateful that in my lifetime many countries have legalized gay marriage. -
chico_chik2127 November 2020As a mexican LGBTQ+ member in my early thirties, I've known this story ever since I can remember, and to see it portrayed on the big screen, with such quality production, with a compelling narrative, and that can make straight people understand a little bit of our brotherhood excites me a LOT!
I'm so thankful that Director David Pablos took a chance to make this film, and to make such relevant characters, the main arch is so powerful, I have to confess the female characters surprised me for good, Amada en Luz are so relatable Mexican women, and the secondary characters from the "Club" gave so much depth to the story.
I hope this film will remember everyone why is important to keep fighting for our rights, our right to be a normal person within society. -
anohso12113 May 2021I have no patience for people who use others. The wife was willing to compromise but the husband was too hellbent on fulfilling his desires. The neglect of the wife irritates me so much I could not sympathize with the 41.
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laduqesa17 May 2021It's not often I sit through the credits at the end of a film. Usually I'm up and out of the armchair to make a cup of tea or whatever. This film was different and the ending was mundane but devastating for the viewer and the main male character.
The film is a heavily fictionalised version of a real event, that of a police raid on a party held by high society homosexuals. Ignacio de la Torre, the son-in-law of the then President, was meant to have been one of the participants. This much is known to history and from IMDB's résumé. From these bare bones, a whole film is woven as a prelude to the raid.
Ignacio holds a high position in society partly through his own wealth and partly through the patronage of his wife's father. Some things about his true life are known, that he and his wife led separate lives, for example, and were only together in public; in private they occupied different wings of their mansion. From this gossamer thread a love story emerges that may not even be true - we cannot be sure that Evaristo Rivas had a relationship with Ignacio or was even present when the ball was busted as the names of the participants were withheld. It doesn't matter. A whole, tender story of forbidden love is recounted by the film, a love that is unacknowledgeable in Mexican society at the time.
The film doesn't hold back. It shows the horror of a gay man trying to sleep with his wife. It shows the hatred that slowly grows out of resentment on both sides of a chaste marriage. It shows how happiness can be shattered in an instant by bigotry and ignorance.
The two male leads were stupendous and didn't skimp their roles. Those kisses were real. Their glances, their interaction, their physical moments together were the opposite of contrived. Mabel Cadena playing Amada, Ignacio's wife, visibly aged during her time of calvary. Her face and bearing changed convincingly from those of a pretty young bride to those of a bitter and spurned woman.
The sets and costumes were magnificent. I actually wondered if some of the scenes were filmed in real buildings, so convincing were the locations. The minor characters, even, were somewhat fleshed out rather than simply being drivers of the plot.
I loved this film and would recommend it. -
ciffou16 May 2021The movie is well made but there is definitely a lack of vision. It seems like every shot if an hommage of everything that has already been done before and by someone who has an extensive background on advertisement. It's pretty but it feels empty. It is extremely obvious the way they want to punctuate the "stiff" life and the "joy" of the underground life but it never feels authentic. Many of the performances feel wooden as if they were making sure we understand what they want to convey, instead of pulling us into the story. We don't even get to extensively see the joy of the dance and we don't see the consequences and humilliation inflicted in them either. It's not terrible but it is not a movie that successfully tells an engaging and believable story and the never-ending parade of "artsy" shots are just too much.
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lasttimeisaw8 September 2021"Providing equal footing in Ignacio's furtive love affair with Evaristo Rivas (Zurita) and Amada's conjugal misery for unknowingly marrying a gay man, Pablos tries arduously to sift out something more palatable to today's taste, although he has not much leeway since the whole affair is a brutal tragedy of homophobia and unlawful persecution happened over a century ago. Ergo, Amada's plight is limned in minutiae, often framed in the center of a symmetrical background, she is seen rigidly entrapped in a mirthless environment, she and Ignacio's wedding night intercourse is the antithesis of sexual gratification, she is bewildered and demoralized, aggravated by Ignacio's constant absence (wallowing in the fraternal company inside the secret club), and no tidings of bundle of joy, Amada is on the verge of going off the deep end, until she discovers Ignacio's secrecy and slowly, the table begins to turn."
read my full review on my blog: Cinema Omnivore, thanks. -
rabbitfish6322 May 2021A good cast and talented designers are left out to dry by incompetent direction and especially screenwriting. The characters are inconsistent and have no development arc. The understanding of social roles in history is abandoned for nonsensical melodrama. The most centred sex scenes are heterosexual, and queer love is left as a strangely posed affair in long shots.
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jp_9120 November 2020"El baile de los 41" is a great film based on true events, a great love story about two men and their gay friends, a tale about homophobia and some events that still happen in this days, closeted gay men married with ladies. The production is amazing, the cinematography and filming locations are beautiful, the music score is wonderful, the performances are great, mainly Alfonso Herrera, Emiliano Zurita and Mabel Cadena and the direction is really good. A modern gay classic movie based on sad true events! The best Mexican film of the 2020!
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nlsteven-attheMovies9 November 2021This Mexican gay drama has the potential to be great. Instead it makes a mockery of the gay culture and being gay, utilising largely straight actors to play gay roles and stigmatising gay men as effeminates and sex perverts. Its (true story) source material is undeniably compelling and important. Coupled with a strong lead performance by Alfonso Herrea, the film's beautiful set designs, costumes and cinematography, D41 is ultimately a decent period drama. Just skip the WFT ending.
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DogePelis201516 May 2021The film tells us a very interesting real event and its production quality is good; however, it is boring and fails to tell a story that is good or even memorable.
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Kirpianuscus1 September 2021It can be better is the first conclusion after its end. And, obvious, it is true . But the film has many virtues who is not fair to ignore. The exploration of a sensitive episode of early Mexican XX century is the first. Second - the atmosphere, architecture of tension, the clothes and rooms, the decent use of fragments of informations about the case, the pledge for tolerance, reasonable picture of a world, the refuge and the good acting, Mabel Cadena being the good example. A film who reminds old, basic truths about vulnerability, appearences, compromises, public image, desire and the reality behind sparkles. So, a good way to tell a high uncomfortable story.
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ozjosh3 October 2022Dance of the 41 is a laudable, but mostly clumsy attempt to dramatise a real event in Mexico's gay history: the arrest of 41 (or was it 42?) high-profile gay men at a drag ball in 1901. The tale is largely told from two points of view. First there is Ignacio, the closeted son-in-law of Mexican President, Porfirio Diaz. Second, the President's daughter, Amada, who is Ignacio's increasingly disillusioned and embittered wife. She sets out to find where her husband disappears to at nights and doesn't much like what she discovers. It's a plausible construct, based on rumours about the real Ignacio's sexuality, and rumours of his presence at the ball. The problem is that the film skews a little too heavily to Amada, especially since it is presumably aimed primarily at a gay audience. Sure, Amada's position deserves some sympathy and her motivation should be clear, but "Dance" places her front and centre, when it really should be Ignacio's story. This isn't helped by Mabel Cadena giving a feisty and nuanced performance as Amada, opposite a somewhat two-dimensional and at times downright wooden Alfonso Herrera as Ignacio. While Amada seethes and rages and plots revenge, Ignacio becomes increasingly cold (to her at least) and careless and unpleasant. The plotting also renders Ignacio somewhat stupid, in that he notices he's being followed but still attends the ball, presumably without raising any concerns about the surveillance. The secret gay club and its annual dance are also problematic. There's an orgy scene that is the silliest since Kubrick's oh-so-tasteful and beautifully lit orgy scenes in Eyes Wide Shut (here we get rows of gleaming white baths - seriously! - and gorgeous candle light). And I couldn't help wondering about the club engaging a small orchestra for their ball, yet apparently no security. The gay cliches and stereotypes also come thick and fast, further evidence that most of the effort went into sets, costumes and locations, and not nearly enough into the characters and the plot. Overall, Dance of the 41 is a sumptuous looking film, but only intermittently engaging. And the more you think about it, the more it falls should of what could have been.
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jordanbishop-7536926 July 2021So much could've been done to lift this to higher quality. The premise had such potential but let down by the screenplay. The actors did what they could with the dialogue but often fell flat. I somewhat enjoyed it but wouldn't watch again.
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atractiveeyes15 May 2021This is a very nice well made movie with a beautiful sad heartbreaking important true story that is beautifully written and told. Performances are superb and real. The film also has great production design and amazing costumes. Dance Of The 41 is a must see biography and it's on Netflix now, you have no excuses.
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jerzbouy-427-236723 January 2022It took three sittings to finish the movie. A good ten minutes could have been cut, maybe more. Parts of the movie dragged; no pun intended. It ended as if it ran out of time leaving you to wonder what happens to the Congressman. As for the "forty-one" you only learned one died and left the rest to your imagination.
That being said it was a decent movie and needed to be told. We must never forget the good, the bad, and the evil in our histories.
For forty years or so I cursed my birthdate but was thankful for these last thirty-seven. -
danybur15 May 2021Brief summary
Remarkable approach from the melodrama centered on a love triangle of a social, political and sexual scandal that occurred in Mexico in 1901. A dazzling staging and a first-class script and performances in a film with Viscontian echoes.
A testimony of the homoodium of that time (which did not stop at class privileges) and which continues to have renewed echoes in the present that are far from being silenced, particularly in countries like Mexico and many others.
Review
The film begins with the lavish engagement party of the ambitious deputy Ignacio de la Torre (Ignacio Herrera) with Amada, the daughter of Mexican president Porfirio Díaz (Mabel Cadena) back in 1900. What nobody knows yet is that Ignacio is a A covered homosexual who attends a kind of clandestine gay club and ends up linking up with Evaristo Rivas (Emiliano Zurita), an employee of Congress.
This remarkable film by David Pablos brings together a host of successes. First, because it bets on melodrama to address a scandalous historical event that occurred in 1901 in Mexico City and that no one had dared to address, concentrating the plot on the love triangle that Torres, Amada (a true irony that was called that) and Rivas constitute. , with its progressive and complementary stories of love and heartbreak. However, the scenes that take place in the club are enough to describe the profile of its members, their codes, their dynamics and the activities that took place there. On the other hand, the socio-political context is very clearly exposed and without annoying underlining. This approach marks a huge difference from Hollywood "fact-based" products that are information-saturated in their all-encompassing claim that produces schematic developments of their characters.
Monika Revilla's script (not coincidentally also the scriptwriter of Someone has to die) is extremely precise, in a story where the characters speak only what is necessary.
The staging is dazzling: the setting and the costumes conveniently place us in the high social extract of the characters, the photography is wonderful and the director achieves an accumulation of effective, expressive and virtuous sequences that accompany, when necessary, to their characters. As in all good melodrama, irony and a certain bitter humor are not lacking, as in an anthological scene in which Amada plays the piano.
The performances of the protagonists are very good, in characters that present various nuances within their well-defined profiles in a story that is a true pressure cooker.
Dance of the 41 is a testimony, on the one hand, of how not even money and privileges could put a free and private sex life absolutely safe from homophobia, homo-hate and the derision of the political, religious and social establishment of the Mexico (and the world) of then and that continues to have renewed echoes in the present that are far from being silenced, particularly in countries like Mexico. -
paulclaassen29 November 2022Little did I know at the time of watching 'Dance of the 41' that it was based on fact. The film depicts the life of Mexican businessman and politician Ignacio de la Torre, who was homosexual.
Ignacio married the Mexican President's daughter, Amada Diaz, and it is believed that he enjoyed favoritism due to this fact. This is why he was not arrested during the raid of the cross-dressing ball which was attended by 41 gay men. Ignacio is believed to have been the 42nd.
In the film, the 42nd member of the gentlemen's club is Ignacio's lover, Evaristo - whom I believe to be a fictional character. Back in the late century being gay was something that was not spoken of, and men married by tradition because their parents wanted grandchildren. As such, Ignacio and Amada had very little in common, and she apparently lived in a separate wing in his mansion. This allowed Ignacio more than enough time to spend with Evaristo, and in the club. Ignacio used every excuse not to be intimate with Amada.
I didn't find Ignacio a very likable character. In fact, I found him rather selfish and did not approve of his behaviour towards Amada, with whom I sympathized. Ignacio blatantly deceived his wife for his own sexual pleasures. I really liked the free-spirited Evaristo (and the handsome Emiliano Zurita portraying this character).
'Dance of the 41' is a classic tale of forbidden fruit. It is also an unusual love story. The film has a hauntingly beautiful score, and is well photographed. My main criticism would be that the film sends out a wrong message, making heterosexuals believe all homosexual men like to dress up in women's clothing. This is a generalization and by no means fact.
'Dance of the 41' has an abrupt ending, simply stating information about one of the lead characters without showing anything relating to it on screen. It was as if the film was looking for an excuse to end on a sad note. Nevertheless, this was a good watch and I enjoyed it. -
patinomd16 May 2021This only talks about one moment of this history, the main importance of the history of Ignacio, is that he was one of the wealthiest man in Mexico, a country that is poor, one of his workers was Zapata, one of the main men that begun the revolution in mexico, that ended up with the removal of the one that was his protector, the father of Amada, president Porfirio Díaz, this dance, gave the revelation of what everybody knew what he did. When you look for this event in history, one of the main questions asked is: did he had a sexual relationship with Zapata?, the masculine macho Mexican man, that was a hero in the Mexican revolution, Zapata worked for Ignacio (nachito) taking care of his horses, after this event, resigning and saying that Nachito's horses were treated better that the workmen where he was from. I understand that this talks about the dance, but a character was fictional, if it would have been better seeing this two histories met, the timeline would have been faster, this real event would have been also explained..
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I Love this movie. based on real events. a dance against homophobia and that reflects one of the most controversial and stigmatized episodes in the history of Mexico. the camera shots, the music, the costumes and the high-level performances and at the same time I consider that the representation of the LGBT community in the cinema is very important and thanks to the cinema this type of stories can be told.
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qui_j14 May 2021While this costume drama is visually appealing, the script is poor and the acting really bad. Looks like all the money was spent on the costumes but very little spent on the more technical aspects like ensuring good audio and editing for good story continuity! With a better script, it might have achieved its full potential.
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mujacko200217 May 2021I love period films but i already had an inkling that it may not have ended well for certain main characters in the story. The film evokes helplessness amidst power, commitment amidst torture, for better or for worse, alive but not living. The setup was superb, A1 actors, just the right amount of everything. I just hope to see a mexican gay film that has a happy ending.