Bound by family yet divided by fate, two sisters take opposing paths; Elena (Miroslava Stern) into wealth and respectability, Maria (Elda Peralta) into exploitation on the streets. When their lives cross again, desire and betrayal spark a devastating reckoning.
In her third feature, pioneering filmmaker Matilde Landeta, one of the first women to direct features in Mexico, uses the melodrama genre to enter into a seedy underworld of pimps, cabarets and sex workers. Landeta, who financed her own early films and fought tirelessly against a hostile industry, crafts a nuanced depiction of women’s lives, where sisterly solidarity emerges amid exploitation. Formally inventive and socially daring, it challenges Golden Age cinema’s patriarchal archetypes and reclaims melodrama as a radical cinematic space.
Stronger Than Love: Too Much Mexican Melodrama!
Paired with Mexican melodrama Nobody's Wife, in a strand curated by Invisible Women: Stronger Than Love: Too Much Mexican Melodrama! is delivered with the support of BFI FAN, awarding funds from The National Lottery and Filmoteca UNAM.
Too Much: Melodrama on Film
Running from October - December 2025, Too Much: Melodrama on Film is a UK wide programme supported by BFI and BFI FAN which celebrates the visual excess and dramatic potency of a form of cinema which champions emotional intensity over propriety and ‘good taste’. This autumn, we're presenting live events and classic titles, to make you swoon, weep and make a scene!
Explore Too Much: Melodrama on Film
Director Matilde Landeta
Year 1951
Duration
1h 41m
Language Spanish with English subtitles
Cast Miroslava Stern, Elda Peralta, Ernesto Alonso