Dale de betún Review: Ten Minutes of Pure Shoe Polish Chaos

If you have ten minutes and a strange love for vintage Spanish archival finds, yes, watch this. It is weirdly catchy. But if you hate scratchy audio and old black-and-white shorts with zero plot, you will absolutely hate it. 👞

I stumbled on this while looking up early Spanish sound films. It stars the legendary Antoñita Colomé, who has this incredibly high-energy presence that almost makes you forget you are watching an ad.

The whole thing is basically about getting your shoes shiny. Yes, really, that is the entire point of the film.

It feels a bit like those bizarre early American shorts, similar to Cupid's Hold-Up, where everyone is just incredibly happy to be on camera. There is no real story to follow here.

Instead, we get people singing about betún (shoe polish) like it is the most important invention in human history. Juan de Landa shows up looking very big and serious, which makes the goofy musical numbers even funnier.

The sound quality is pretty rough, though. Honestly, it sounds like it was recorded inside a giant metal bucket. 🪣

But there is this one moment where a guy is polishing a boot so fast his hand becomes a total blur. It made me laugh out loud because of how intense he was.

It has that same chaotic, slightly messy energy you find in early talking comedies like Goin' to Town. Nobody is trying to make high art here; they are just trying to sell you stuff with a big smile.

The main song gets stuck in your head, too. I found myself humming the little shoe polish jingle while doing the dishes later.

It is not a masterpiece, obviously. But as a tiny, weird window into 1940s Spain, it is pretty charming. 😄