Do not miss this list of the best Mexican movies of yesterday and today that will make you enjoy the magic of cinema in all its registers. Mexican cinema has bequeathed wonderful pieces to the history of cinema, some better known and others less so, in a long cinematographic tradition from which current seventh art animals such as Guillermo del Toro, Alfonso Cuaron and Inarritu emerge.
- You can also read: The 60 best movies of the 90s for moviegoers.
Romantic Mexican Movies Mexican
cinema, rooted in a culture with a rich tragicomic obscurantist imagery, has been little given to the romantic genre. However, since the 1990s, some films have managed to win the hearts of viewers and critics. 1. Como agua para chocolate (Alfonso Arau, 1992)
Rarely has a literary triumph of the magnitude of Como agua para chocolate, by the Mexican writer Laura Esquivel, been transferred so successfully to the cinema. It was done in 1992 by the director Alfonso Arau and the result was one of the Mexican love movies with a great international impact.
The film reflects the soul of Mexican art, with a tribute to magical realismset in a love story in times of the revolution. In this case, gastronomy is used as a metaphor for Tita’s frustrated love, condemned to remain single to take care of her mother. 2. Sex, modesty and tears (Antonio Serrano, 1999)
After a few years of creative drought, the nineties were refreshing for Mexican cinema and received the name of New Era. At that stage, one of the great successes was undoubtedly Sex, modesty and tears, which was on billboards for 27 weeks .
Antonio Serrano wrote it to be staged in the theater, but after its success he decided to adapt it to the cinema, where he received the final boost. The key was in the direct and humorous way in which a series of stories that reflect onthe war of the sexes, the crushes and the disappointments in love . 3. Amar te duele (Martha Higareda, 2002)
The romantic Mexican movies had another rebound with the premiere of a tender and brave movie like Amar te duele, by Martha Higareda, which over the years has become an icon of pop culture in the country
The success of the story, in addition to being very well told and having a fast pace, is the presentation of love as a source of tension for economic differences and social discrimination in Mexico . It presents a plot schematic with the classic love story of a young upper-class girl and a humble student who have to challenge her environment. mexican horror movies
Although it has never been the star genre in Mexico, horror has been quite successful in Mexican cinema. The following titles stand out as the most successful among the dozens of scary movies. 4. The Vampire (Fernando Mendez, 1957)
The Mexican homage to Bram Stoker’s Dracula resulted, as early as the late fifties, in a cult movie that is still, for many, the best horror movie ever made. has done in Mexico.
The Vampire, by Fernando Mendez, seizes the viewer in a psychological and fantastic terror. The story of a peasant girl who goes to visit her sick aunt and the harrowing journey she undertakes along an unknown path hand in hand with a suspicious traveler.they combine the myth of the vampire with the Mexican rural world . 5. Macario (Roberto Gavaldon, 1960)
Ten years after Los Olvidados, by Luis Bunuel, Roberto Gavaldon challenged the genre with Macario, resulting in a film that mixes drama, terror and magical realism . Because from the tragic portrait of misery that overwhelms the viewer, the director develops a progression that leads to comedy and the leading role that fantasy acquires.
In addition to the approach to the misery of the Mexican peasant, which offers a rich social perspective, it introduces magical, traditional and atavistic elements that are reflected in the relationship of the peasant Macario with death on the eve of the Day of the Dead.6. Even the wind is afraid (Carlos Enrique Taboada, 1969)
One of the essential names in Mexican horror movies is Carlos Enrique Taboada, who, in addition to the movie that we bring up here, rose to fame with Veneno para las hadas (1984 ) to overwhelming critical acclaim and several well-deserved awards.
However, the film that made him known was Until the wind is afraid, the first great terrifying movie with public success in Mexico. The effective argument (a banshee who wants to possess the body of a student terrorizes a girls’ boarding school) was executed with a practical rigor that gave the film quality. In 2007 he inspired a remake to be forgotten. 7. Chronos (Guillermo del Toro, 1993)
The debut of one of the reference names in fantastic cinema today, Guillermo del Toro, speaks for itself of the qualities of genius. Cronos presents many elements that he has later perfected in Pan’s Labyrinth or The Shape of Water.
A magical item from the time of the Inquisition gives the power of eternal life to its owner, and will change the life of an old man when he accidentally falls into its hands. With this argument, Guillermo del Toro laid the foundation stone for a cinema that stimulates the imagination through a suggestive alliance of terror, suspense and tenderness .
- It may interest you: The 15 best horror movies in history.
Mexican Comedy Movies
If culture is the embodiment of national character, Mexican cinema perfectly reflects the sharp sense of humor of Mexicans and their tendency to satire and jokes. From there have come hilarious and witty movies that you can’t miss. 8. There is the detail (Juan Bustillo Oro, 1940) The unforgettable character of Cantinflas , who has made entire generations laugh all over the world, made his debut as a leading role in what is also his most hilarious film.
There is the detail, by Juan Bustillo Oro, it is the typical comedy of entanglements in which fortuitous situations give rise to the most absurd scenes.
The agility of the film aroused the applause of the public and critics, but above all, it showed for the first time what later became known as the “cantinfleo”: the graceful verbiage with which, in this case, Mario Moreno Cantinflas blames himself before the judge. 9. Herod’s Law (Luis Estrada, 1999)
The best Mexican comedy of all time, and it is because it masterfully combines the two sides of the soul of Mexican culture : satire and tragedy. Humor and drama go hand in hand in this feature film that has been singled out as black humor.
The first scene leads the way: the inhabitants of San Pedro de los Saguaros mercilessly behead the mayor when he tries to flee with the town’s taxes. It is, in addition to a great movie,a criticism of the corruption that shocked the country at the time . 10. Paraiso (Mariana Chenillo, 2014)
After a few years without much luck in the Mexican comedy film, the film of a budding director like Mariana Chenillo dazzled the public and the critics. The fresh air that Paraiso transmits is one of those pleasant surprises that the cinematographic talent in Mexico continues to provide.
The key to the success of this film is its lack of pretension: Chenillo abandons the biting and excessively refined humor to offer a light comedy that is both tender and welcoming. A love fable, a story of overcoming and personal growth, according to the director, around the adventures of a fat couple .Mexican drama
films At the same time, Mexican art is deeply impacted by the problems of the human soul and social criticism, and this has been reflected in breathtaking films that invite reflection. The best Mexican directors have taken full advantage of the dramatic genre. 11. The Forgotten (Luis Bunuel, 1950)
The Spanish filmmaker Luis Bunuel, who in his exile became a Mexican national, shot an unforgettable film in 1950, The Forgotten, which earned him the award for best director at the Cannes Film Festival and showed why It is in the Olympus of the history of cinema.
In a drama inspired by the Italian neorealism of Roberto Rossellini, with the stamp of bunuelian surrealism, transports us to the tragic daily life of poor children in the marginal neighborhoods of Mexico City. It also forces us to question ourselves about the close link between poverty and juvenile delinquency. 12. Red Dawn (Jorge Fons, 1989)
This film won the San Sebastian Film Festival prize surrounded by great controversy: firstly, because it dealt with a taboo subject at the time, the Tlatelolco massacre of 1968, and secondly because despite the originality of the content, the criticism was very harsh with the performances and the technical means. It was a box office hit.
The film is not only one of the best Mexican productions of the eighties, but it is also a triumph of the Mexican left against censorship.that the Institutional Revolutionary Party had imposed since 1968 in reference to the massacre. 13. The Alley of Miracles (Jorge Fons, 1994)
In addition to returning a fantastic director like Fons to the top of the genre, this film will be remembered for seeing the birth of a star: Salma Hayek. In this case, the play presents an urban drama based on the homonymous novel by Naguib Mahfuz that moves the action from Cairo to Mexico City.
The film swept the Ariel Awards of the Mexican Film Academy with a swarm of interconnected personal dramas. Fons has inspired a whole generation of great current directors like Arturo Ripstein with that talent to express the dreams that want to fly in the raw social realities. 14. Deep Crimson (Arturo Ripstein, 1996)
Probably one of the most fruitful marriages that dramatic Mexican films have produced is that of Arturo Risptein and Paz Alicia Garciadiego. In 1996, the screenwriter wrote the story of two lonely souls who meet under dark coincidences, and the director turned the verb into flesh in one of the saddest and most wonderful films of the Mexican cinema of the nineties .
When a woman cheated by a small-time swindler leaves her children to elope with him, he realizes that a sacrifice of such magnitude can only carry the message of the fullness of life: both embark on a painful path towards transformation . . 15. Amores Perros (Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu, 2001)
Within the New Era of Mexican cinema, Gonzalez Inarritu consolidated one of the most watched films of Mexican cinema outside of Mexico, Amores Perros, from there he rose to international fame until he gained a foothold in the mecca of cinema with titles like 21 grams, Babel, Birdman and The Revenant. Amores Perros is so raw, so real, and so heartbreaking.which becomes one of those cinematographic treasures that combine public success and cult dimension. Through a fortuitous accident, the narration of three stories takes place in which the performance of Gael Garcia Bernal and the urban drama of the underworld stand out. 16. And your mom too (Alfonso Cuaron, 2001)
The same year that the public applauded Amores Perros, another young talent of Mexican cinema, Alfonso Cuaron , premiered one of the best Mexican films of the 21st century: Y tu mama tambien. Once again, Gael Garcia Bernal assumes the interpretive weight accompanied by the Spanish Maribel Verdu on a journey towards sensuality and youth.
The moving journey of a car where the innocence of three teenagers full of dreams and life travel also becomes a panorama of the social drama that extends along the roadsides. Cuaron directs this film with the same cinematographer with whom he won the Oscar years later with Gravity, Emmanuel Lubezky.
The movie also left, by the way, a memorable kiss between Diego Luna and Garcia Bernal. 17. The crime of father Amaro (Carlos Carrera, 2002)
In the path of the real dramas that were so successful in those years, the director Carlos Carrera surprised with one of the most controversial films of Mexican cinema. The crime of Father Amaro, in addition to generating a wave of protests and demands for censorship in sectors of the Catholic Church, became the highest grossing movie in Mexico.
In this social tragedy , the hypocrisy of the Catholic Church is denounced through the story of Father Amaro, played by Gael Garcia Bernal, who convinces an underage girl with whom he has secretly had sex, to have an abortion in a clinic. underground where she bleeds to death.
- More cinema: 30 movies to cry (romantic and dramas).
Mexican Thrillers
Suspense continues to be the pending task of Mexican cinema. The purity of the classic thriller has derived, in Mexico, either to fantastic horror, or to social drama, leaving this genre an orphan, except for one piece that you cannot miss. 18. Carmin tropical (Rigoberto Perezcano, 2016)
The good health of Mexican cinema was exhibited on the big screen in 2016 with a feature film directed by Rigoberto Perezcano, who also wrote the script: its overwhelming success consisted in betting on a genre with little travel in Mexico , the thriller, and remove it from its usual canons to give it a twist of social criticism.
And it is that the story that the director masterfully narrates, both in written and artistic language, covers the return of a transsexual woman to her hometown after many years investigating the death of a friend of hers. Safety pin. Mexican Independent Films
The fruitful history of Mexican cinema has also given rise to rare films that one does not know very well where to classify. In classic cinema we hear the echo of Alejandro Jodorowsky, and in current cinema Carlos Reygadas stands out. 19. El mole (Alejandro Jodorowsky)
One of the rarest films that Mexican cinema has produced was signed by director Alejandro Jodorowsky in a symbolic western with high doses of mysticism and surrealism. The story of a cowboy who seeks the meaning of life through justice and enlightenment offers disconcerting scenes that include the performance of cripples and deformed.
Four enlightening masters (critics link it to the four gospels), a dwarf bride and a band of deformed outcasts make up the cast of characters that accompany the protagonist, El Topo, to an ending as surreal as the film itself. 20. Post Tenebras Lux (Carlos Reygadas, 2012)
Although its premiere at the Cannes festival scandalized the most purist critics, with Post Tenebras Lux its director claimed himself as one of the most ambitious and talented filmmakers in current Mexican cinema and of the immediate future.
That yes, the movie is weird as could be, because the bizarre narrative with which the director presents us with some existential issues seemed to many an empty drama very much in the style of the gimmicky avant-garde of the moment. However, the director himself explained after being booed at Cannes that “if you could understand the argument, it would no longer make sense.”
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