Bullfighter and the Lady

Robert Stack stars in this 1951 drama as Johnny Regan, a brash, cocky American sportsman who gets a master class in bullfighting from master torero Manolo Estrada (Gilbert Roland) while vacationing in Mexico. Bullfighter and the Lady is actually a quasi-autobiographical tale—enhanced with melodrama, romance, and redemption—from director/co-writer Budd Boetticher, who trained as a bullfighter in Mexico. Stack appears with a platinum blond coif that literally spotlights him in the crowds of dark-haired Mexicans as his character blunders his way through the ring like the proverbial bull in a china shop until a death humbles him. Boetticher infuses the production with a reverence for the sport and a love of the Mexican culture, but some of that was missing in the original release, which was trimmed by 40 minutes—although it still earned Boetticher an Academy Award nomination for Best Writing, and catapulted him up to the A-list of directors. Debuting on DVD and Blu-ray, this director's cut restores the eliminated footage, making for a much richer movie. Bullfighting films are a hard sell in the U.S., but this one really gets to the heart—and art—of the tradition. Recommended. (S. Axmaker)