Written in ENTERTAINMENT the 24/7/2022 · 18:53 hs
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Despite being one of the jewels of the time of the Mexican Golden Cinema, Pedro Armendariz he took his own life when he was at the height of his acting career and was only 51 years old.
The actor’s career began in 1935, when he was 22 years old and recorded ‘María Elena’; such was his success that from that moment he accumulated more than 100 films.
The famous acted with greats like Dolores del Río, María Félix and Emilio ‘El Indio’ Fernández; In addition, he was awarded 2 Ariel Awards and was part of one of the James Bond movies alongside the legendary Sean Connery.
In the 1960s he was diagnosed with cancer and, although he underwent treatment, it developed metastases and in 1963 his doctor informed him that he had less than a year to live.
Hearing those terrible words the artist decided to take his own life by shooting himself in the heart. Only with the passage of time did it become known that he was not the only one to develop the disease, but that the cast of a ‘cursed movie’ ran with the same fate.
Pedro Armendáriz and 150 more people would have been victims of a ‘cursed movie’
In 1956, when his name was already consolidated in the entertainment world, Pedro Armendariz agreed to participate in the project ‘The Conqueror of Mongolia’.
After that, the tragedy knocked on his door, but he was not the only one: it is estimated that up to 150 people who participated in the film, including actors and staff, would have died affected by some type of cancer.
The Mexican did not actually die of the disease, since Upon hearing his fatal fate, he decided to shoot himself in the heart with one of his collection weapons. (and while in a California hospital).
“He said, ‘Go get me a sandwich,’ and I said yes. When I returned I found him dead. In the mere heart he did it, ”explained his widow, Mrs. Carmelita Pardo, remembering the sad moment.
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The reason why ‘The Conqueror of Mongolia’ was considered a ‘cursed movie’ was the number of deaths he carried. Until 1981 an explanation was given in this regard.
At that time, People magazine published an article in which the children of John Wayne, who was also in the film, suspected that their father had been in contact with strong radiation.
And it is that the filming of the aforementioned film occurred in a dangerous area of the Utah desert, where the government of the neighboring country had previously carried out nuclear tests.
“Because the Cold War had just ended, they had to find a place that resembled what the story required. The director chose the Utah desert, very close to the town of St. George and 200 kilometers from Yucca Flat, the Nevada test site where 11 atomic bombs had exploded”, he referred to the YouTube account ‘Línea del Tiempo’ .
Research published in People reported that, by the early 1980s, of the 220 people who participated in the film ‘The Conqueror of Mongolia’, 91 had some type of cancer and 46 had died for the same reason.
That was how the life of Pedro Armendarizenormous figure of the time of the Mexican Golden Cinemaculminated in the midst of the tragedy and after having participated in a ‘cursed movie’ that was shot in the wrong place.
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