A Cinderella Story for the 21st Century

In the telenovela I am watching, All for Love, the viewer is exposed to one of the most famous tropes known to telenovelas: the Cinderella story. However, it is not portrayed in the way that most people would think. Instead, the male protagonist, Joaquin, is the one coming from poverty. While Irene is not overly wealthy in any way, she is the one that is the up and coming pop star. Joaquin comes from a poor province where he worked as a farmer and a soldier. He comes to the city where Irene lives in order to find his sister, but he first must find work.

I thought it was really interesting how they did a more modern take on a Cinderella story. I thoroughly enjoyed this take in which the man is not always the female protagonist’s savior. Of course, Joaquin finds himself saving Irene from various dangerous situations throughout the show, but he is not placed in the show to save Irene from financial burden or whisk her off to a better life. Irene is self-sufficient enough to have her own goals. She wants to become a superstar in the music industry and works hard to achieve that goal. She consistently stands up for herself to big producers and asserts herself into meetings with radio stations. Irene knows what she wants in life, and having a love interest certainly does not hinder those plans. Instead, she finds herself helping Joaquin in many different situations, whether that is searching for his sister or trying to get him a job. Having Joaquin in her life is a benefit to her already developed character, as opposed to being the reason her character has any development. She is very headstrong and determined, which is super refreshing to see in a female protagonist, but especially in a telenovela. I loved seeing a representation of feminism in Irene’s character in a TV genre that does not always do the best job of portraying it. 

Joaquin is the one that is looked down upon for his status in All for Love. He does not come from a wealthy part of Colombia. He comes to the city with next to nothing and has difficulty finding himself a job. Even Irene’s own mother looks down on his job that involves a lot of manual labor. That job is similar to that of Irene’s father and her mother attempts to stray her away from Joaquin due to how her own husband turned out. She even goes as far as to tell Joaquin that Irene is meeting up with her boyfriend when he shows up with flowers at her family’s market. I really enjoyed this aspect of the show. The fact that Joaquin had to win over Irene by just his own charms and acts of kindness added something to their romance. I loved that they were both deeper characters and had things going on besides their love story. It made their obstacles to be together so much more intriguing to watch and added a deeper level of class differences to the show. It was well-written and felt like a much more modern take on a classically done genre of television.