Excellent but underrated film

Absolutely the worst movie.

By the time the dramatic fireworks start popping off, each one feels earned.

Blistering performances.

Perhaps the most beautiful casting in classic cinema in almost a fantasy-like small Mexican town, this movie reads like short stories similar to a fairy tale (or folk tale) background. There's little subplots intertwining Cyd Charisse, Yvonne De Carlo, Pier Angeli, Ricardo Montalban and Vittorio Gassman. It's quite entertaining if not a bit odd with Cyd Charisse's climax dance on the mountain. She also danced with Ricardo Montalban in several movies (Mark of the Renegade, On An Island With You, The Kissing Bandit, and Fiesta) and they make a gorgeous pairing. Surprisingly and sadly after their success, the director/producers for this film didn't put them together for this film. Still it's a happy, charming tale. Objectively I rate it a 6 but due to the wonderful casting and Cyd dancing, it's a 7.This movie is really hard to find since there's no DVD out there so you have to view it on an old videotape (that may be converted to DVD) or wait until TCM shows it (maybe once a year if at all).

This was an interesting movie. The good: plenty of good looking people in the cast. Hard to argue against Pier Angeli, Cyd Charisse, Yvonne De Carlo, Ricardo Montalban, Jose Greco etc. The photography is beautiful, with full and lively colors. The two major dance sequences are quite good (although, as for the Charisse dance, bizarrely placed). And for what I believe is an American production, doesn't push the insensitive envelope too much.The not-so-good: I'll go back to the Charisse dance. I sure didn't see that one coming. It literally seemed like the producers said, "Hey, Cyd Charisse is in the picture, let's make sure she dances, even if there's no reason why she really should." The pace of the film died off considerably over the second half (a couple of dramatic scenes just took too long). And it's really weird, as always, to watch fight sequences from back in the day. I believe one man literally jumped up and was caught by another guy on his "attack". Something that could only be pulled off in a spoof.Personally, though, I'm not going to pass up a movie with Cyd Charisse in it, 'cause she's dreamy, and a hell of a dancer. I vote 6.

This film is based on short stories by Josefina Niggli, whom I met when she was teaching at the Univeristy of North Carolina in Chapel Hill -- the plot outlined by the previous contributor is quite thorough, but does not mention the fine performance of Yvonne DeCarlo as Maria, of the River Road, and most especially does not mention the magnificent dance number performed by Cyd Charisse on a mountaintop in the rain -- unforgetable!!!

A bizarre but thoroughly entertaining tamale pie of a movie focusing on the lives of various peasants in a Mexican village. Typical of Hollywood films in the '50s, there are several anglo actors playing Mexicans, but at least Ricardo Montalban (playing Pepe Gonzales!) is the real thing. And he's got charm TO BURN! As difficult as it is to believe, Rick Jason is possibly more handsome than Montalban - and certainly taller at 6'4". In his autobiography, Jason mentions that Montalban became concerned during the filming when Jason seemed to be stealing the scenes in the rushes.I don't recall seeing so many beautiful stars assembled for a single film: Pier Angeli, Yvonne De Carlo, Cyd Charisse, Vittorio Gassman. Wow! That's reason enough for tuning in, but there's other stuff to treasure as well, such as the flamenco dance by Jose Greco, which is as spectacularly good as the dance number with Cyd Charisse is spectacularly bad.