Review by EdgarST

"Pantaleón y las visitadoras" (1975) is the first film adaptation of Peruvian writer and politician Mario Vargas Llosa's excellent novel, it was shot in Dominican Republic, apparently due to censorship in Perú. I saw it when it opened in San Juan, Puerto Rico, but during a trip to Panama, where there was also a military regime, I found out the film was censored there too. Apart from the inclusion of Katy Jurado and Rosa Carmina (definitely not in their prime), there is very little to save. The 2000 version was an improvement, but still none of the two films make justice to Vargas Llosa's prose and original narrative techniques. This 1975 film seems to have vanished from the planet!