When his mother Dolores dies, Juan Preciado, son of Pedro Páramo, goes to Comala to claim his inheritance; but when he arrives he finds an abandoned and sinister place, inhabited by mysterious voices and whispers…
Cinematography
Comala's bleached bones and shadows breathe Rulfo's prose
Writing
Adapting unfilmable literature with structural audacity
Director
Carlos Velo
John Gavin
Pedro Páramo
Ignacio López Tarso
Fulgor Sedano
Pilar Pellicer
Susana San Juan
Julissa
Ana Rentería
Graciela Döring
Damiana Cisneros
Augusto Benedico
Padre Rentería
Beatriz Sheridan
Eduviges Dyada
Rosa Furman
Dorotea la Cuarraca
Joaquín Martínez
Abundio Martínez
Jorge Russek
'El Tilcuate'
Eric del Castillo
Perseverancio
Trivia, insights & behind the scenes
Rulfo's novel is considered untranslatable to cinema; this 1967 attempt by Spanish-Mexican director Carlos Velo was the first of many failures, including a doomed Malick adaptation decades later.
John Gavin, playing the iconic Mexican cacique, was a Hollywood actor and later US ambassador to Mexico—perhaps the most surreal casting choice possible for this role.
MX
