El ministro y yo
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| El ministro y yo | |
|---|---|
| Directed by | Miguel M. Delgado |
| Produced by | Jacques Gelman |
| Written by | Mario Moreno Tito Davison Carlos León |
| Starring | Cantinflas Chela Castro Angel Garasa |
| Music by | Gustavo César Carrión |
| Cinematography | Jorge Stahl, Jr. |
| Editing by | Gloria Schoemann |
| Running time | 100 min |
| Language | Spanish |
| IMDb profile | |
El ministro y yo (Spanish: "The minister and I") is a 1975 Mexican film.
[edit] Plot
Mateo Melgarejo (played by Mario Moreno "Cantinflas") is a notary public and scribe for the illiterate people of Santo Domingo, a neighborhood north of Mexico City's Zócalo. A squatter friend asks for his help in negotiating with the land census bureau to regularize a land title. After a great deal of frustration with the government bureaucracy, he writes a letter to the cabinet minister, earning an audience with him. The minister hires Melgarejo to reform the bureau, and the appointee proceeds to lecture the officials on their duties in a democratic society. At the end, he gives up the post, returning to Santo Domingo to help its poor residents.
[edit] Criticism
The comedian La India María had replaced the "Cantinflas" character as the cinematic icon of Mexico's urban and rural poor, and critics viewed El ministro y yo as an attempt by Moreno, whose media influence made him one of Mexico's elite, to get back into touch with the common people. The unrealistic portrayal of a sympathetic cabinet minister and the unlikely appointment of a "commoner" to a position of power did not reverberate with the public.
