Violeta (Ninón Sevilla), performs nightly at Club Changó in Mexico’s seedy red-light district – until she finds a newborn baby dumped in a bin and chooses to raise him as her own. Facing poverty, police, and the child’s violent father (Rodolfo Acosta), Violeta turns to prostitution to survive – but she never stops dancing.

With sensational dance numbers, high-stakes emotion, and a plot that swings from nightclub glamour to prison tragedy, Emilio Fernández crafts a story of defiance and devotion. Sevilla’s performance is volcanic: she dances like a goddess and fights like a mother possessed. Newly restored, this is Mexican cinema at its most operatic and unapologetically emotional.

“Goes full throttle with an engrossing redemption melodrama about a nightclub dancer who raises an abandoned baby” — New York Times

“As one of the quintessential cabaretera films from the golden age of Mexican cinema, Victims of Sin moves at the quickening pace of the Afro-Cuban rumba dances we witness throughout” — Slant

“A tumultuous product of Mexican cinema’s Golden Age, the movie is a perfect storm, the confluence of three huge talents” — Artforum