Rouben Mamoulian in/on Mexico

Mamoulian (third from right) on the set of The Gay Desperado, a major hit when I played the film at Morelia International Film Festival in October 2025

Catalogue note for the Imaginary Mexico section of Morelia International Film Festival. — EK

It was not only Mexico that Rouben Mamoulian’s imagination transformed into a cinematic feast over the course of his illustrious career. Born in Tbilisi to an Armenian family, this classic Hollywood master used cinema as both a painter’s canvas and a musical score to reimagine cultures, countries, and cities—including those he knew well and had lived in. Thus, through a series of films now considered canonical classics, Soviet Moscow, Victorian London, and Imperial Sweden were rendered in unexpected colours, where life often unfolds with a lyrical, almost musical, rhythm.

Three of Mamoulian’s films have connections to Mexico: The Gay Desperado (1936) is set in Mexico but was actually shot in Arizona. The Mark of Zorro (1940) takes place in Alta California, filmed in Southern California. Blood and Sand (1941) is set in Spain, but was partially shot in Mexico. Even if these portrayals stem from the familiarly ahistorical blend of Hispanic culture, Hollywood glitter, and Mexican imagery, they nevertheless brim with joy and visual splendour, flourishing within their imaginary and impossible terrains.

The Gay Desperado features one of Mamoulian’s most memorable opening sequences, in which as Mexican bandits watch American gangster films, they glean ideas on how to mechanise their criminal enterprises. The story unfolds with great charm and visual grandeur as a kind of musical, in which the Mexican bandit abducts a young tenor to indulge his craving for good music. As Tom Milne notes, Mamoulian clearly fell in love with “the picturesque vistas offered by colonial architecture, haciendas, cactuses and sombreros.”

A ravishing display of Mamoulian's dazzling technique and mastery in directing action scenes, The Mark of Zorro is set in 1820 and tells the story of the brash Diego Vega (Tyrone Power), who, tired of military academy life in Madrid and its pointless duels, renounces violence and sails back home to the then-Spanish city of Los Angeles. There, he discovers that his father—the former mayor—has been ousted, and the people are suffering under heavy taxation and inhumane treatment at the hands of a ruthless Captain Pasquale. Donning a black mask and dark cape, Diego becomes Zorro and rides against tyranny.

A masterpiece of dream and downfall, Blood and Sand is a tragedy told in light and colour. This is Mamoulian’s ultimate “painterly film,” the result of laborious study of Spanish masters like Goya, Velázquez, and El Greco. Their influence is translated into tableaux of desire, seduction, and death with the help of cinematographers Ernest Palmer and Ray Rennahan, who won an Oscar for their Technicolor work.

Juan (played as an adult once again by Tyrone Power) is a half-starving, illiterate yet ambitious young man who dreams of becoming a matador. Fuelled by obsession, he rises swiftly to fame, only to lose everything—including his devoted wife—after being seduced by the vampish Doña Sol (Rita Hayworth). The bullfighting scenes, with Mexico City’s Plaza de Toros standing in for Spain, are nearly silent and impressively authentic. Yet Mamoulian largely refrains from showing the fights in full, capturing only brief, dramatic glimpses. In one striking image, an overexcited spectator spills dark red wine down the edge of the ring stand—evoking blood. The film’s strangely serene depiction of violence is enriched with religious iconography that foretells death in the afternoon.

Given the trio of Mamoulian’s “Mexican films,” Imaginary Mexico has never been so full of song, movement, and colour.