La Tentacion (1991)

Susana (Angelica Chain) has won the lottery and just after finding out of her winnings, she calls up her married lover and unapologetically tells him to fuck off for good. 

Susana then moves to a luxurious home in Acapulco where she settles in rather quickly. Susana & her best friend Veva (Luz Maria Jerez) then proceed to live a life of luxury & party away at the local nightclubs without a care in the world. After a night of hard drinking & dancing, Susana meets a young street vendor nicknamed “Gato” (Sebastian Ligarde) and randomly hires him to drive her home & he then ends up not only driving her home, but also has sex with her & Veva. Veva returns home to her husband which leaves Susana feeling lonely, so she decides to hire Gato full-time as a her chauffeur/bodyguard and proceeds to hire 3 more men: Jaime (the accountant), Liberio (the chef), and Figueroa (the gardener). Susana now has 4 men living & working for her, which gives her a power trip and even more so when she teases them into sexual situations. Sometimes they get to fuck her, sometimes they don’t. 

Susana has always been manipulated by men & always at their bidding, so now with her having 4 men at her own bidding—she feels powerful & abuses her men all she wants. When the 4 men grow tired of Susana’s abusive ways, they band together to rid of her and steal all of her money. 

La Tentacion (aka "The Temptation") was written by prolific Mexican film critic & screenwriter Francisco Sanchez and directed by Enrique Gomez Vadillo and this duo made a film that is quite unique & very gritty. With its runtime of 75 minutes, La Tentacion wastes no time and treats us to much vulgarity, violence & sexual content. There’s even a Bible reference which consists of Susana biting into an apple as a symbolism of temptation. This was definitely a Francisco idea since he was an arthouse auteur in his early days. And what of Vadillo’s ideas are in La Tentacion? Well, just about everything else really. All the familiar traits of his are in this film which are homosexual overtones, the luxurious beach setting (ironically the same house from La Muerte En La Playa is featured here), and violent situations that really get out of hand (a bloody feast).

I enjoy La Tentacion more than I probably should, but it is an entertaining film and if you thought La Muerte En La Playa was amazing, then for sure you’ll think of La Tentacion the same way as well. Around this time, Angelica Chain was getting close to retiring from acting and this being one of her last films is something very interesting to see considering she married a jealous wealthy man in real life.