Untouched — Untouched( Blu Ray)
Untouched (aka Sombra Verde) is a torrid Mexican jungle melodrama from 1954. Here from Indicator/Powerhouse is a US/Canada-only Blu-ray release of the film. It takes in a new 4k scan, a commentary track, and a few other extras
The film is presented on the disc in two different versions: the original restored Spanish language print with new English subtitles and the contemporary dubbed English language release. This review will concentrate on the Spanish print but the differences with the English version will be discussed where relevant.
Untouched was directed by Roberto Gavaldon, a leading light of Mexico’s ‘Golden Age’ of cinema (the 1930s to early 1960s) and at the time best known for stylish urban melodramas (such as In the Palm of Your Hand (1951) and The Night Falls (1952)) which have many points in common with classical American Noir. Gavaldon had a career-long commitment to melodrama as a valid art form (think Douglas Sirk). Gavaldon’s skill with this form of melodrama is evident from the second part of Untouched. But its opening section deploys quite different skills, with the director using extensive location shooting in the jungles of Veracruz to depict the protagonist and his guide’s nightmare journey across hostile terrain facing a vast array of dangers (wild cats, snakes, vultures, fires and deluges).
In Untouched barbasco root from which cortisone can be extracted is discovered in the Mexican jungle. A pharmaceutical company sends scientist Federico Gascon (Ricardo Montalban) to find the root. The trek proves to be difficult. Federico’s guide Pedro Gonzalez (Jorge Martinez de Hoyos) perishes. Crossing a bridge with his horses and Pedro’s body Federico implores a man on the other side for help. Instead, the man chops away the bridge’s moorings with a machete. Crawling ashore after nearly falling to his death via waterfall Federico is actually rescued by his would-be nemesis, Don Ignacio Santos (Victor Parra). At the man’s compound, Federico finds himself falling in love with Ignacio’s feral daughter, Yascara (Ariadne Welter). Further complications ensue.
The first part of Untouched is taken up with the quest and ultimately Federico and Pedro becoming lost. The dramatic spine is the relationship between the two men. The script skilfully delineates the fault lines of class and ethnicity. Federico is perceptive and decent enough to realise their mutual dependency and even imperils himself to return Pedro’s corpse to civilisation after the latter succumbs to a snake bite. The dialogue is smartly and stylishly handled. Gavaldon is aided immeasurably by the contributions of his scripter, Luis Alcoriza, who wrote the Luis Bunuel classics Los Olvidados (1950) and The Exterminating Angel (1962).
When Federico arrives at Ignacio’s jungle encampment the film literally changes genre. From the jungle survival premise, it changes to rural noir and Gavaldon’s talent for austere melodrama kicks in. The film takes the form of a heightened but not vulgar drama anchored by the three leads.
The most internationally famous actor, then as now, is Ricardo Montalban. Most famous to modern audiences as Mr Roarke, the suave host of the popular but odd Fantasy Island TV series and also as Khan Noonien Singh in the Star Trek fan favourite feature film Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, Montalban was already a known quantity in both the US and Mexico when he starred in ‘Untouched’. After features in Mexico Montalban made a splash in Hollywood eventually making a movie with the prestigious William Wellman in 1951. In Untouched the actor is very much in screen idol mode, buff and handsome but he already displays the understated humour and urbanity that made him a popular character actor in later years. Montalban is paired with the beautiful Ariadne Welter as the fiery yet innocent Yascara and the attractive pair have great chemistry together. Yascara has been brought up in an atmosphere of total freedom, free from the social strictures her father resents so much although Ignacio remains highly protective and something of a martinet. Welter gives a performance of dignity, wilfulness and vulnerability.
The final main figure is Ignacio Santos. Because of social disapproval and after stealing money Ignacio eloped with the woman who became his wife. After creating and settling in the compound he calls ‘Paradise’ she gave birth to Yascara. There Ignacio is known as “the Outsider” and helps locals with their disputes with authority. Victor Parra brings hurt dignity and gravitas to the role.
All the action with the principals is well staged in crisp, atmospheric photography. In many ways Untouched resembles US noir’s approach to sexuality: implicit and understated but very much there. However, this is not the case with one notorious scene. Having posed provocatively, Yascara joins Federico in the river. Reemerging from the water, her soaked shirt makes her nipples clearly visible and this is acknowledged in Montalban’s reaction. Although presumably partly intended as titillation Gavaldon and Alcoriza cleverly avoid prurience by giving the scene context as Yascara explains love with the aid of male and female mud figurines. The sequence emerges as sexy, touching and wholesome. But such a scene would still have been unthinkable in any mainstream Anglophone cinema of the time. The sequence is almost entirely excised from the dubbed US print.
Untouched is a taut, handsome, dramatic and passionate film blessed with intelligent scripting and a masterly approach to directing.
The Indicator Blu-ray disk, limited to 3000 copies is provided with some useful contextualising extras. US scholar of Mexican cinema David Wilt provides a thorough background to the movie in his audio commentary. Film Historian and TV host Rafael Avina gives a thorough history of Roberto Galvadon’s place in Mexican cinema in a documentary entitled Playing with Fire. In a second documentary, Casting a Shadow filmmaker and writer Roberto Fiesca gives a comprehensive overview of the careers of Ricardo Montalban and Ariadne Welter. There is a contemporary Spanish language trailer and an image gallery
Roberto Gavaldon has been reassessed recently with major retrospectives of his films in both the US and Mexico. Indicator/powerhouse has made an important contribution to the rediscovery of this major director of Mexican cinema with this Blu-ray debut of one of his major works.