Sunday, October 11, 2020

The Days of The Bricklayers.

 What is an Albañil? An albañil is a bricklayer. A construction worker. This is a job that has been portrayed in the past many times, but the movies made by Adolfo Martinez Solares and Gilberto Martinez Solares made this blue-collar job iconic basically. These movies said if these guys in this line of work can bang attractive women like Angelica Chain and party it up without a care in the world, then so could I. They very much appealed to this audience/demographic. The El Dia de Los Albañiles (Day of the Bricklayers) movies have been familiar to me since I was child and they were movies that even then I found so peculiar but was still very amused by them as well. And I wasn’t just amused because of the nudity in all 3 movies, but also for the movies being so funny and having good stories to tell about albañiles we never thought twice about whenever we'd see them.  

Mexcinema Video corp VHS cover of the 1st movie.

A flyer promoting the theatrical releases of the 3rd movie. The back of the flyer features a coupon for a free gift to men and jokes told by Alfonso Zayas.


El Día De Los Albañiles (1983)

In the first Dia De Los Albañiles, the movie opens with a group of albañiles having a sexual rendezvous with loose maids from a nearby neighborhood. “El Sonoramico” by La Única Sonora Maracaibo plays as the raunchiness in the construction site goes on. This is a clear introduction of what’s to come in the movie basically. Sort of. 


We then meet Roberto (Alfonso Zayas) and his short uncle (El Borras) who have just been fired from their Indian dancing jobs & feeling hopeless of how they’ll make ends meet next. Lucky for them they meet a beautiful blonde named Beatriz (Angelica Chain) who gets them jobs as albañiles at a construction site where she works serving food to all the workers there. Roberto and Beatriz then begin a romantic relationship; despite their obvious differences in appearances & mindsets. Roberto is very care free & dim-witted whereas Beatriz is a serious & adoring woman. 


Beatriz being such a gorgeous woman; attracts the attention of the charismatic young architect Enrique (Miguel Angel Rodriguez). Enrique wants Beatriz badly and at first she rejects his advances since she is with Roberto, but when Roberto gets caught up with the loose cousin of the construction manager; she begins to date Enrique thinking he’s the better man in her life instead of Roberto. Enrique of course is far from being the dream man she thinks he is considering he’s been providing a drug-laced drink to some of his workers that would give them the energy to work more, but later end up dying horrible deaths from side effects of the drug. Their deaths are also insured, so Enrique’s company basically profits off every dead worker of theirs! 


The first El Dia De Albañiles is a very simple & entertaining movie. The movie has plenty of female nudity to catch your eye, especially coming from Angelica Chain who has an amazing body you cannot look away from at all (aye!). Rossy Mendoza also appears in the movie and while it’s a brief moment, it is however very (very) memorable. The movie has a lot of corny jokes that’ll make you chuckle here & there and they’re all of the sexual nature of course. Luis de Alba is very memorable in this movie playing his famous character Juan Camaney. We are all a little like Juan Camaney and that is what makes him so likable & so fucking hilarious.


El Dia De Los Albañiles is worth watching and it’s also a movie that I feel despite its age, still feels fresh & can be enjoyed by all for years to come. 


This was Adolfo Martinez Solares’ debut as director. Adolfo’s own son Yahir Martinez Solares stars as the little boy in the movie. La Unica Sonora Maracaibo perform their other famous song "La Chancla" at the end.






















El Día De Los Albañiles II (1984)

Roberto and Beatriz are now happily married or so it seems considering Roberto has been philandering alongside Tun Tun whom he’s reunited with after years of not seeing his little old friend. Roberto continues to work as an albañil as well as Juan Camaney who has been screwing around with a punk girl at work. The architect of the construction site is played by Hugo Stiglitz and he has his eye set for Beatriz so bad and when he finally gets her after she leaves Roberto; we begin to realize why he really wants her and we also find out he’s the individual that’s been killing hookers around the city! 


El Día De Los Albañiles II is basically just like the 1st movie, but with a slightly more interesting story and double the Angelica Chain. By that I mean she plays dual roles in the movie; she plays Beatriz and her long lost red-headed twin sister which Juan Camaney falls heavily in lust with. Roberto gets into more mischief in the movie alongside Tun Tun who is always a pleasure seeing since he’s always hilarious. Hugo Stiglitz of course plays the perfect bad guy in the movie. It’s always more believable seeing him in that type of role instead of a “hero”


Adolfo Martinez Solares makes a small cameo in the movie as the man who brings Tun Tun a hooker his size. Adolfo’s other son Adolfo Jr plays Pepito in the movie. Luis De Alba plays his other famous character “El Indio Maclovio” in this movie for a brief scene.



















El Día De Los Albañiles 3 (1987)

Roberto and Beatriz are still married and working the same jobs, their son Pepito is growing up, Tun Tun is still around and the maid Maribel (Maribel Fernandez “La Pelangocha) from the first movie appears again and this time she has a story of her own. The movie’s biggest plot point is the 1985 Mexico City Earthquake. This earthquake leads to a chain of events for all the characters, one main event is the untimely death of Beatriz and Pepito going missing. Maribel the maid is in love with her employer who just happens to be the architect of the building where Roberto & Tun Tun are working in. When she finds out she’s pregnant with his baby, the architect rejects the idea of being with her and while she contemplates suicide, the earthquake then strikes and the architect goes missing. He doesn’t get lost in the rubble as thought, he actually ends up kidnapped by a sleazy worker named Alberto & his brother who use him to blackmail the architect’s scheming sister who has claimed he died in order for her to grant his estate! 


While the movie has the usual comedy & nudity (provided mainly by Angelica Chain); El Dia De Los Albañiles 3 has more drama to it and action as well. Either way, the movie doesn’t fail to entertain and the movie ends just as the first movie did, only this time however Tun Tun dances away awesomely. 



















All 3 El Dia De Los Albañiles movies are good on their own. You necessarily don’t even have to watch all 3 movies to understand everything going on since each movie feels unique and the characters are easy to get familiar with. So pick whichever to watch first. Now there is a 4th Albañiles movie, but that movie is far different from these 3 and features nobody from the original movies. Should you watch it? Sure. Might as well. It is however not connected to the first 3 movies that I speak of here, but it was made by the same folks at Frontera Films though. 


Out of all 3 (or 4), El Dia De Los Albañiles 2 is my favorite. Albañiles 2 for me is so memorable & bizarre & fun. Plus there’s a serial killer in it and we all love a little brutal crime in our movies sometimes, que no? Alfonso Zayas dresses “punk” in it as well. How can you not like that? 


Watch all 3 El Dia De Los Albañiles in HD on Picardia Nacional. Subscribe now at https://www.picardianacional.com It is worth every peso/dollar!