Alma de Hierro (Soul of Iron - 900 minutes - English Captions) Our hero is an upbeat, smart, charming, blind man. He has graduated at the top of his class and wants a teaching job.
Before we're done, in great telenovela tradition, he and one of his students have seduced each other, fallen hopelessly in love and have been thwarted, both by her father (who still packs the torch for his mother!) and a teaching assistant who tricks him into marriage.
In the meantime, we become acquainted with his familia, a loving but contentious group: an arbitrary, short-tempered padre, a patient but weary madre and various siblings and in-laws. Jorge Poza plays the blind man very convincingly and we end up loving his "glass-half-full" attitude. The student is a spoiled little wench who has a LOT of growing up to do! Both of the parents end up with new partners, new babies and Papa's own father marries another man.
In addition, (SPOILER ALERT!) our appealing hero is DEAD! Killed by that baby-faced but evil, teaching assistant. Eek!
I really like the lingering backward look the long-time couple exchange as they part. My DVD from Amazon.com is loaned out regularly to friends who didn't even know how much they would like telenovelas!
