Customer Reviews

La Madrastra

5 star:		(9)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

I'm no stranger to not only watching telenovelas but also watching them on DVD..and let me asure you, it's WAY better on DVD.

For people who are concerned about this telenovela being edited...yes it's true, but in a very very very good way! They have taken out all the filler scenes and kept only the real important points and guys, you have no idea how much better it is this way, especially if you have seen it on TV and you know how much the producers drag on story lines to make room for advertisements and more episodes

As for the story, "La Madrastra" is a fantastic "who done it?" murder mystery soap that is a great remake of a classic. Everything from the layout (at least on the DVD) to the actors is perfect. Victoria Ruffo played her best role on TV since "Simplemente Maria" and I am happy to see her shine once more.

Once I popped this DVD unto my CD player, I found it nearly impossible to stop watching! The storyline was so addicting and thrilling. I highly recommend this telenovela for people who are looking for a great story that doesn't revolve around senseless love drama but rather entertainment based on mystery.

SINOPSIS:

Maria has been jailed for 20 years for the murder of her best friend, crime which she didn't commit. Granted parole, she embarks on her mission to recuperate her family, who has erased her existance to her own children and now only exists as a vague memory in their minds. Maria plans an elaborate revenge that will take many months to not only get her family back, but to find out the real killer....who is among their closest friends and family. Everyone had their own agenda and reasons to do it, and thoughout the run of this soap we uncover truths and clues leading to the one and only killer.

The English subtitles make this Latin Soap Opera on DVD a guilty pleasure for anyone who enjoys a great who-done-it and the secrets of the most disfunctional family in history. Maria is the Madrastra (the Stepmother) who looks great even after 20 years in prison wrongly convicted of murder. Will she ever be able to win the love of her 2 unaccepting step?? children. Can Hector find true love without cheating on his wedding night?? Will anybody learn to lock the door before you kiss or tell a family secret?? As the family falls apart with people jumping off the roof, out the windows, hitting each other with golf clubs, pushed? down the stairwell, or looking for about a 100 confessional letters hidden like easter eggs. Its all fast paced with lots of steamy romance and intrigue. Enjoy

Overall LA MADRASTRA dvd set was very enjoyable and suspenseful but the editing was SHOCKING ! I understand that they have to chop it down to fit on 3 double sided discs but one of the sides didnt have much content at all and they really could have used that space!!
I saw many highlights of the show on the Review Show on E! THE SOUP and decided to buy it to see the full scenes but then they were cut out and the highlights showed more than the actual dvd release!! It was like someone recorded it off television and cut the ads out and kept forgetting to record again when it came back .
For all the episodes it does allow you to see they were fantastic and 100 times more dramatic than an American soap like General Hospital , Passions or Bold and the Beautiful.

I reccommend this to any viewer of soaps Spanish speaking or not that is looking for something different .It is fast paced (don't even blink)and way more intense !There is so much more than just U.S Daytime soaps.
And when are they going to release dvds of American soaps anyway ???

I first learned about this series through E! network's The Soup, and since I like soap operas and 'La madrastra' looked really good, I had my friend buy it for me for my birthday. While the series was definitely entertaining, I was deeply disappointed by the editing choices. The first disc, and the first side of the second disc, seemed to have a decent, if at times a little slow, pace, but when the second side of disc two started to go so fast that the killer was already revealed to all I became so confused that I was convinced that there had been a manufacturing error and I was really watching side two of disc three. This was not the case; it turns out that the majority of disc three is extra features.

As a result, entirely too much is cut out from this release. The majority of the material on these DVDs focuses on Esteban, María, Héctor, and Estrella, and to some extent Leonel, Ángel, and Pulpo, which is a shame because of those seven I only really liked Ángel. I don't know if it's the editing or the writing, but I couldn't fathom why María (or Daniela, or Fabiola, or Ana Rosa, or Alba) would ever want Esteban, especially all that he put her through. Meanwhile, their two children, Héctor and Estrella, were unbearable as characters. Héctor was especially infuriating since he went from hating María for being with his father to seemingly accepting her after she bailed him out of jail to being a belligerent jerk again after Alba threw herself down the stairs. And I cannot understand why so much DVD time was dedicated to Pulpo and his issues with the four boys that he took in, which was boring and didn't contribute anything to the overall storyline.

Meanwhile, characters that I actually enjoyed and wanted to learn more about, like Bruno, Fabiola, and Daniela, appeared maybe once per disc side. We were told that Bruno and Fabiola had a child that they placed in an instutition, but we are never told why; nor do we ever find out that Patricia was pregnant with Bruno's child when she died, or find out Fabiola's reaction. Likewise, we are told that Daniela's sister and Ana Rosa's mother, Sofía, died under mysterious circumstances, but the only time that she's mentioned again is when Ángel mentions that Demetrio and Sofía were married first, which was terribly confusing (so Ana Rosa was sleeping not only with her aunt's husband, but also her ex-stepfather?). We're also denied Daniela's reaction when she finds out that Demetrio is Ángel's father, and when Esteban finds out that Ana Rosa's child was not his but Carlos's.

It's not just their parts, though -- the climax of the series, when Héctor and Estrella find out that María is their mother, is edited, so that we go from their immediate facial reactions to the family happily chatting together. And the scene that I was looking forward to, when Alba poisons Rebeca, was tragically and unforgivably edited so that we only see Rebeca's last death throes. This edits are all made even more infuriating by the sheer number of times in the first disc that we have to see María crying to Father Belisario about her children.

In all, if you've seen this program and you only cared about the San Románs, Leonel, and Pulpo, then you'll love this DVD set. If you were looking forward to some scenes with Bruno, Fabiola, Demetrio, or Daniela, you'll be sorely disappointed.

La Madrastra was by far the best telenovela that I had ever seen on television which is now available on DVD. It represents the coming of age of Mexico, its people, and a triumph for Mexican television. Victoria Ruffo and Cesar Evora, the two main characters of this soap opera gave a wonderful performance and truly made the viewer fall in love with their characters, demonstrating the type of love we all yearn to have.

Here is a partial list of the of the actors and the characters they played as taken from the Internet Movie Data Base:

"Victoria Ruffo ... María Fernández Acuña (2 episodes, 2005)
César Évora ... Esteban San Román (2 episodes, 2005)
Eduardo Capetillo ... Leonel Ibáñez (2 episodes, 2005)
Jacqueline Andere ... Alba San Román (2 episodes, 2005)
Ana Martín ... Socorro de Montes (2 episodes, 2005)
Martha Julia ... Ana Rosa Márquez (2 episodes, 2005)
Guillermo García Cantú ... Demetrio Rivero (2 episodes, 2005)
Cecilia Gabriela ... Daniela Rivero (2 episodes, 2005)
René Casados ... Bruno Mendízabal (2 episodes, 2005)
Margarita Isabel ... Carmela San Román (2 episodes, 2005)
Sabine Moussier ... Fabiola Mendízabal (2 episodes, 2005)
Patricia Reyes Spíndola ... Venturina García (2 episodes, 2005)
Joaquín Cordero ... Padre Belisario (2 episodes, 2005)
Lorenzo de Rodas ... Servando Maldonado (2 episodes, 2005)
Mauricio Aspe ... Héctor San Román (2 episodes, 2005)
Michelle Vieth ... Vivian Saussa (2 episodes, 2005)
Miguel Ángel Biaggio ... Ángel San Román (2 episodes, 2005)
Ana Layevska ... Estrella San Román (2 episodes, 2005)
Sergio Mayer ... Carlos Sánchez (2 episodes, 2005)
José Luis Reséndez ... Greco Montes (2 episodes, 2005)
Mariana Ríos ... Lupita Montes (2 episodes, 2005)
Ximena Herrera ... Alma Martínez / ... (2 episodes, 2005)
Arturo García Tenorio ... Leonardo Montes 'DaVinci' (2 episodes, 2005)
Carlos Bonavides ... Rufino Sánchez "Pulpo" (2 episodes, 2005)
Marcial Casale ... Mañas (2 episodes, 2005)
Liza Willert ... Rebeca Robles (2 episodes, 2005)
María Luisa Alcalá ... Fanny (2 episodes, 2005)
Mario Casillas ... Dr. René Ruben (2 episodes, 2005)
Mariana Karr ... Carcelera (2 episodes, 2005)
Archie Lafranco ... Luciano Cerezuela (2 episodes, 2005)
Marcelo Buquet ... Gerardo Salgado (2 episodes, 2005)
Diana Golden ... Patricia Ibáñez (2 episodes, 2005)
Montserrat Olivier ... Patricia Ibáñez (2 episodes, 2005)
Óscar Morelli ... Director de Cárcel (2 episodes, 2005)
Rubén Morales ... Detective Figueroa (2 episodes, 2005)
Rocío Cárdenas ... Angélica Espino (2 episodes, 2005)
Pilar Pellicer ... Sonia (2 episodes, 2005)
Sergio Catalán ... Flavio Marinelli (2 episodes, 2005)
Germán Gutiérrez ... Dr. Huerta (2 episodes, 2005)
Daniel Berlanga ... Friend of Héctor and Estrella (2 episodes, 2005)
Sergio Jurado ... Investigator Muñoz (2 episodes, 2005)
Alejandro Ruiz ... Dr. Alejandro Ruiz (2 episodes, 2005)
Irma Serrano ... La Duquesa de Walterrama y San Calixto (2 episodes, 2005)
Alfredo Adame ... Presentador (2 episodes, 2005)
Juan Ignacio Aranda ... Juez de Aruba (2 episodes, 2005)
Alberto Chávez ... Arnoldo (2 episodes, 2005)
Miguel Ángel Fuentes ... Fausto (2 episodes, 2005)

Stephanie Gerard ... Maggie (2 episodes, 2005)
Dioni González ... Reportera (2 episodes, 2005)
Santiago Hernández ... El Pulgarcito (2 episodes, 2005)
Manuel Medina ... El Cadenas (2 episodes, 2005)
Lourdes Munguía ... Lourdes (2 episodes, 2005)
Arturo Muñoz ... El Panteón (2 episodes, 2005)
Andrés Márquez ... El Panzas (2 episodes, 2005)
Frances Ondiviela ... Frances (2 episodes, 2005)
Jorge Orduña ... Joel (2 episodes, 2005)
Vicky Palacios ... Vicky (2 episodes, 2005)
Laura Pausini ... Herself (2 episodes, 2005)
Joustein Roustand ... El Huesos (2 episodes, 2005)
Alberto Salaberry ... Benjamín (2 episodes, 2005)

Raúl Sebastián ... El Greñas (2 episodes, 2005)
Ricardo Vera ... Oncólogo (2 episodes, 2005)
Irma Berlanga (2 episodes, 2005)
Paola Cano (2 episodes, 2005)
Alejandra de la Reguera (2 episodes, 2005)
Susana Diazayas (2 episodes, 2005)
Evelyn Nieto ... Flor (2 episodes, 2005)
Pablo Osuna (2 episodes, 2005)
Claudia Platt (2 episodes, 2005)
Mauricio Sauret (2 episodes, 2005)
Gloria Solache (2 episodes, 2005)
Sofia Tejeda (2 episodes, 2005)
Ángeles Yáñez (2 episodes, 2005)."

Quite an impressive list of Mexico's finest actors who deserved every award they won.

The soundtrack to the telenovela was performed by Laura Pausini, a Latin Music Favorite Artist, for which the music plays itself in my head over and again.

La Madrastra was a great novela, no it was beyond that. I never saw it on TV, so from reading about it, it seemed like a novela that I would really enjoy, so I ordered it. Boy, was I right. The editing was great, cause I didn't feel like they left out anything. It was so exciting that, I just couldn't stop watching it, I wanted to see what was going to happen next. I really really enjoyed it and if you have not yet watched it, I do recommend you buy it. You won't regret it.

I enjoyed the DVD. Since I had not watched the full version on TV, I do not know what important scenes I missed, but the story was just fine. It flowed. I was just a little bit unnerved by seeing Victoria Ruffo in a bedroom scene. (I am so used to her characters crying, I just never saw her doing some scenes :-) )

The DVD itself is 4 discs - double sided. It is done by Xenon, who used to do the DVDs for Televisa. Its annoying to wake up from time to time and flip the disc, but I survived.

Caveat Emptor - The story is abridged, so please don't post comments saying that you are disappointed that the whole story was not in the 4 discs. That's just the way it is. Abridging the story also means that Plot B and C and filler scenes are left out. Thank the heavens for that!!

Note to Televisa
1. release longer versions of these novelas
2. Release the novelas on REGION FREE DVDS and BLU RAY.
3. Release the novelas with subtitles in other languages apart from English (for the sake of those who are deaf, and people in other parts of the world who watch these novelas)

Does it come with english subtitles???Please let me know,i love novelas but always a problem no subtitules,thanks for help,it does look good so........ just didnt buy yet

This Telenovela is ok. A bit is on the nerves whom one must wait to see the murderer weir and I think the title of this Telenovela not so well!

I watched this novela when it aired on t.v. i have to say, i was always ereally excited to see what was going to happen next. The tricky thing about this novela that makes it even better is that can't really decided who is the killer because all of the characters are mean. At one point you can say that "he is the killer" or "she is the killer" but when you see other scenes, you may end up saying "ok its not him/her". I didn't know that the DVD had come out because it didn't air on tv. but when i saw it on a store i was like " i have to buy it" i normally do not watch novelas but this one was very very good! I have to congratulate all the actors because they all made this novela alive and interesting. Yes there is a lot of editing but its all good because it does not loose any scene that was important. it is worth buying and watching it. This movie is almost the same as the book called "the westing game" you need to see who is the killer and when you know who it is its like" oh my god, i din't expect that person to be the killer". Buy this novela! and to all the writers who reviewed this novela, come on you don't really expect a whole year of this novela to be 30 or 50 discs! you can't fit all of that in a couple of DVDS!