El Supersabio

Cantinflas plays an assistant working in the laboratory of a well-known scientist. The scientist is after serious research; his assistant wants to find a formula that will keep roses from wilting. When the professor dies, everything comes loose: what he leaves behind is the formula for a cheap fuel, and a company wants to get hold of it. The only person they think knows the formula is Cantinflas. The mould of Cantinflas, the biggest box-office star in Mexican cinema of the forties, is the same here: long, fast speeches driven by wordplay and a flood of talk nobody can answer. The film's idea is a science fiction comedy, but that is not the real matter; the real matter is a man from the crowd making fun of the language of institutions. Miguel M. Delgado directed; the two of them made dozens of films together. The story is simple and the performance carries everything.