Aventurera aka The Adventuress (1950) Mexican "Cabaretera" Noir.

"It's considered a masterpiece of the Rumberas film, and  the classic example of a Mexican 'Cabaretera' Noir." (Noirsville)

Directed by Alberto Gout, written by Alvaro Custodio (story), Carlos Sampelayo, (adaptation) and Alberto Gout (screenplay). Cinematography was by Alex Phillips, and Music by Antonio Díaz Conde.

The film stars Ninón Sevilla (Victimas del Pecado (1950)) as Elena Tejero, Andrea Palma (The Woman of the Port (1934)) as Rosaura de Cervera the "Madame," Tito Junco (The Exterminating Angel aka  El ángel exterminador (1962)) as Lucio Sáenz "El Guapo" (the handsome one) a procurer and  racketeer. 

Ninón Sevilla as Elena Tejero

Andrea Palma as Rosaura de Cervera

Tito Junco  as Lucio Sáenz "El Guapo" 

Also starring Rubén Rojo as Mario Cervera, Miguel Inclán as Rengo (Gimpy) Jorge Mondragón as Pacomio Rodríguez, Luis López Somoza as Ricardo Cervera, Maruja Grifell as Consuelo Tejero, Elena's mother, María Gentil Arcos as Petra, Rosaura's maid, Salvador Lozano as Ramón, Consuelo's lover, Miguel Manzano as El Rana (The Frog), Pedro Vargas as Himself, and Ana María González as Herself.  

Chihuahua, Mexico. Elena the tall, beautiful, fiery red-haired, pampered young daughter of Senior Tejero, comes home one day to find her mother Consuelo Tejero passionately kissing in the embrace of her lover Ramón. 

This sends Elena running in shock from the house she wanders about Chihuahua in a daze. When she returns home later, she finds her now dishonored father sitting zombie like in an easy chair, in deep depression. 

dazed

She finds and reads the "adios (adios mi esposo) muchacho" letter and then hugs him in tears. He decides to blow his brains out as soon as Elena leaves the room. 

Hearing a gunshot - Elana with Enedina Díaz de Leónas Juana, the Tejeros' maid rt.

So now sans mother and father Elena is too depressed to remain in her hometown Chihuahua. She has to quit her dancing school lessons and heads North to Ciudad Juárez to try and find a job to support herself. Every job she finds ends in disaster because all the men she works with cannot keep their hands off her. 

Ciudad Juárez 

Unwanted advances

Tomcats

Even a serving job has the customers pawing at her. 

Sit on my lap Elena, and we'll talk about the first thing that pops up

Elena walking down the street after work near the Pigalle Cabaret runs into an old acquaintance from Chihuahua, Lucio "El Guapo" Sáenz, a real ladies man, i.e a womanizer, who used to flirt with her when he used to hang out around her dance studio. 

Elena tells Lucio her woes. Lucio tells her that he can get her a job as a secretary from his friend Rosaura de Cervera the owner of the Pigalle. Lucio offers to buy her a dinner and then he will introduce her to Rosaura. 

Ana María González

They go in, eat, drink expensive champagne, and dance. While all this is going on, Rosaura is spying down on the proceedings through a louvered vent. Elena is getting a bit drunk. 

Rosaura spying

Finally Lucio brings Elena up to Rosaura's office. Lucio introduces Elena to Rosaura and tells Rosaura that Elena is a secretary and needs a job. Rosaura offers Elena 1000 pesos and a room to live in. Elena is glad for the work. Rosaura tells her maid Petra to escort Elena up to her new room.

Rosaura looking over Elena's merchandize.

As soon as Elena is out of sight, Rosaura pays Lucio his procurement money. Lucio wants a bonus payment because Elena is still a virgin. Rosaura gives it to him. 

Petra returns and Rosaura tells her to make some tea for Elena and to bring it here so that she can slip some knockout powder into Elena's cup. 

Feeling woozie

The sacrificial lamb-ette 

Elena drinks the tea and passes out across the bed. A few minutes later, a man who was obviously probably watching from a peephole, enters the room. 

The screen fades to black and the subtext implied is that the big money paying, "special customer," slime ball who just entered, probably with great enthusiasm, takes her virginity. 

We see the man later, with another notch on his pole, happily tipping Petra.

Thanks Petra for another exquisite deflowering

Elena wakes up, discovers that she has been ravaged and immediately starts shouting. She enters Rosauras office wild eyed, spitting and screaming, that she will report her to the police. 

Policía!!!!

Rosaura has her bodyguard and enforcer Rango rough up Elena. He wrestles her to the floor and pulls out a knife. 

Rango grabs Elena by her hair pulling her head closer to the knife. He holds it pointing at Elena's face. The threat is to make her ugly. Elena pleads for mercy. Rosaura demands Elena's word that she will obey and do as she is told. Elena agrees.

Rango gets up off her. While Elena is still laying on the rug sobbing Rosaura gets Elena's 1,000 pesos and throws the bills down by her head, payment for her first trick. 

Elena soon becomes a very jaded showgirl / prostitute a "cabaretera" in demand at the Pigalle Cabaret. The Pigalle has a stage fronting a dance floor. On this stage the two singers Pedro Vargas and Ana María González perform before the main curtain. To the left is the orchestra band stand. Surrounding the dance floor are two tiers holding dining tables. It all looks like a reasonable set up until the floor show. 

Tonight, Lucio comes back to see if he can hit on Elena.

When Elena's number starts the curtain opens revealing an enormous stage area with Egyptian scenery. Its cavernous easily twice the size of the cabaret. She does a quasi egyptian - quasi harem girl dance with a cast of thirty dancers. Its alot like a Busby Berkley number. It's unbelievable but it's a Cabaretera where meer shithole cabarets transforms into a soundstage at the lift of a curtain. 

Where, in a regular Hollywood film you usually get, say the first minute of the opening of a song, then cut to other conversations or actions in the cabaret while the song plays in the distance, in a Mexican Cabaretera you get the whole song even if it's not performed by any of the principle characters, or the whole dance number (which here is performed by Ninón Sevilla as Elena). We even get another complete samba dance routine reminiscent of Carmen Miranda in another cabaret later. 

Anyway Elena does her number then changes to an evening gown, When she exits the dressing room Lucio is waiting for her. He tries to pick her up but she basically tell him to fuck off and goes to a table where the clients have requested her presence.

Elena with tonight's current trick

Lucio unperturbed just picks up another prostitute / dancer and sits at a different table. The orchestra plays a dance number. Elena's client wants to dance. While Elena and her client dance Lucio's eyes are riveted on Elena. 

The prostitute sitting with Lucio notices this and starts talking shit about Elena. Elena gets pissed grabs the prostitutes' drink and throws it in her face. 

drink in the face

 Of course that starts a hair pulling contest between Elena and the prostitute that gets all the other prostitutes out on the dance floor trying to break them apart. Rango finally grabs Elena and pulls her away.

Elena becomes quite the attraction over the next few months. When she enters the cabaret everyone notices. When she struts seductively around the dancefloor, all eyes and the camera follow, this is all done to the complete song "Aventurera" sung by Pedro Vargas, think of it as the Noir equivalent of a music video. She is Smoking and I don't just mean her cigarette.

The Aventurera Sequence

 Pedro Vargas singing "Aventurera"

That night, Lucio and his newly recruited gang Pacomio Rodríguez and Ray Montoya are in attendance.

At the end of the song Elena is looking over the customers. 

Elena spots Ramón, her mother's lover and the man who broke up her happy home, sitting at a table with friends and prostitutes. Elena angrily blows a double stream of smoke out of her nostrils. It's a nice effect.

Ramón!!!

She storms over grabs a bottle off the table and smashes it over his head. As Ramón falls to the floor Elena starts stopping him with her pumps.  Another melee erupts and Rango must once again drag Elena kicking and screaming up to Rosaura's office. 

Kicking Ramón

Stomping Ramón

Lucio wondering WTF is going on with Elena? With Pacomio Rodríguez and Ray Montoya.

Rango dragging Elena away...

...and upstairs to Rosaura's office

Rosaura wants Rango to cut Elena for attacking a wealthy client, but Lucio and his gang burst into the office with guns drawn. Lucio knocks down Rango and wants to kill him, but Elena takes pity on him and spares his life. Lucio then robs Rosaura of all the money she has on hand. Elena leaves the Pigalle with Lucio.

Not taking this lying down Rosaura finds Lucio's man Pacomio Rodríguez who she knows is a slime ball worm who can be bought off. She pays him to see to it that she will get her revenge on Lucio.

Elena now also becomes part of Lucio's gang. Lucio has a plan to rob a jewelry store. However  Pacomio chickens out at the last minute (according to his plan). 

Pacomio gets cold feet

So Lucio has to use Elena as their getaway driver instead. Meanwhile, Pacomio goes and tips off Rosaura who rats out the job to the police. On the night of the robbery Elena is sitting outside in the getaway car while Lucio and Montoya break in and enter the store. 

Pacomio tips off Rosaura

On the night of the robbery Elena is sitting outside in the getaway car while Lucio and Montoya break in and enter the store. 

A drunk stumbles around the corner and approaches the car trying to pick up Elena. She tries to shoo him away. He asks her for a kiss. While all this is going on, she hears police sirens getting closer. Pacomio has tipped off the police. Elena prudently drives off .

Hola pelirroja, ¿qué tal un beso caliente?

When Lucio and Montoya come outside they get into a gun battle with the cops. Montoya is killed and Lucio is sent to prison. Rosaura has got her revenge.

Time passes. Elena is now working in another cabaret as a popular headliner in Mexico City. There she meets Mario a successful lawyer. Mario is infatuated with Elena and asks her to come with him to Guadalajara. He gives Elena his card. 

Calle Del Ejido, Mexico City 

Rubén Rojo as Mario Cervera

While Elena is getting ready for the next show, slimeball Pacomio, comes into her dressing room threatening to tell the police that she was Lucio's accomplice get away driver on the jewel robbery job. All she has to do to prevent this is to make him her agent. He wants her to sign a contract giving him 50% of her earnings. Elena stalls him, tells him that she'll think about it, and escapes to Guadalajara becoming Mario's fiancée. 

Of course everything goes Noirsville, because after meeting Mario's younger brother Ricardo, she is finally introduced to her soon to be mother-in-law, who turns out to be Rosaura.

Noirsville

Ninón Sevilla is a lot of fun to watch going from innocent virgin to hard as nails cabaretera. It will be a  a pleasure seek out more of her Noir work.

Here is her IMDb Bio - Ninon Sevilla was a Mexican showgirl born in Cuba and raised by an aunt in the populous Centro Habana sector, Ninón Sevilla was graced with feline features, wonderful legs and exceptional vitality. She successfully danced her way through Havana night clubs and cabarets, and arrived in Mexico in 1946, where she made her film debut. Although she had already imposed her eccentric attires and hairdos, it was her association with filmmaker Alberto Gout that determined the creation of her erotic film persona. She rapidly became the icon of the rumbera, an archetype of the Mexican film musicals, a "bad girl" who is dignified by dancing. Ninón became an erotic myth and a superstar, working with the best talent in the film industry (Emilio Fernández, Pedro Armendáriz, Gabriel Figueroa, Agustín Lara, José Revuelta), in the biggest sound stages at Churubusco, choreographing her own complicated numbers, and her fame reached non-Spanish speaking markets, as Brazil and France. She was also among the first to introduce traces of the santería rites in her dances, and to acknowledge the presence of African elements in the Caribbean cultures in her films' stories. With the decline of Mexican cinema in the 50s, Ninón Sevilla retired, but she made a successful comeback in 1980, with "Noche de carnaval", winning the top Mexican award for an actress for the first time in her career.

Tito Junco is excellent as the silver tongued sleazeball womanizer, I got a kick out of his assortment of "low company," in character, hand painted ties. Andrea Palma plays both the cabaret whorehouse madam and the high class matron with equal aplomb and she is very believable. All in all a great addition to the Noir canon 8-9/10.