The Other Woman (2002)

Carlota and Cordelia are physically identical, but on the inside they are complete opposites. Carlota has grown up in a world dominated by her mother Bernarda, who emotionally abuses her and her older sister Eugenia. Cordelia has grown up in a little town surrounded by farms and ranches. Cordelia is obsessed with wealth and power and will stop at nothing to get it. The story begins as Eugenia gets pregnant out of wedlock and Bernarda, embarrassed, sends her to the small town where Cordelia resides. With Eugenia gone and never mentioned, Carlota starts dating a doctor, Alvaro. It's true love, but Bernarda won't allow it, because if any of her daughters get married, Bernada must to give them each their inheritance, which is everything Bernada has. As their love grows, Alvaro's parents move into a ranch in the small town in which Cordelia lives; at their arrival she immediately starts plotting ways to get wealth and power. But on the same day, Alvaro's mom dies of a heart attack and Eugenia dies in childbirth; her child is hidden away from Bernarda because Eugenia discovered her mother's true greedy nature. Grief-stricken Alvaro goes to the ranch. Carlota is also devastated when she learns of her sister's death. When Alvaro returns to look for Carlota he finds a coffin at her home, Bernarda tricks him by saying it is Carlota who has died. He cannot take it and goes to his parents' house. There he meets Cordelia, who takes advantage of his grief over his mother's death, but to her surprise he is immediately taken by her resemblance to Carlota, which Cordelia later uses as her ticket into wealth and power as his wife. As years pass, Carlota is torn apart by Alvaro's "abandonment" and her sister's death, and though she moves away and meets new people, she cannot let go of the past. Alvaro is married to Cordelia and they have a daughter, Natalia, but their marriage is a sham, a mistake from the start. Alvaro cannot let go of Carlota, and Cordelia has never cared about him and is having an affair with his brother Adrian, who is as dangerous as she is. While Carlota is in Mexico city on a trip, Cordelia goes there to stay with Adrian; they meet at the mall and exchange a few words, but Cordelia decides to conceal the fact that she is married to Alvaro. Adrian also happens to see them; discovering that Carlota, is alive he tries to blackmail Cordelia. Meanwhile, as Bernarda strolls through Mexico City she meets a handsome young man who is interested in her: Roman Guillen, the son of the man she had an affair with and ensnared by revealing to everyone they had two daughters, Eugenia and Carlota. Roman does not know it is Bernarda he is interested in until he looks for her in her hometown; once he finds out who she is, he plots his revenge on her. Alvaro and Cordelia continue to fight, which takes its toll on Natalia, who just wants to have a happy family. Cordelia promises to change and complies for a while until a family trip (at Natalia's request) is planned; Cordelia ditches them and asks Carlota to take her place. Knowing how delicate the situation might be, Cordelia tricks Carlota into thinking that Alvaro is a bad husband who abuses any woman in his life, them being two examples. She uses Natalia as the sole reason why Carlota must take her place. Carlota agrees and manages to fall in love with Alvaro all over again; Alvaro feels the same way, unaware that he's feeling this way about Carlota. Shortly after the vacation cruise, Carlota decides to leave her mom's house and moves to Mexico City on her own. Cordelia and Adrian's relationship gets rockier, until Cordelia decides to have him killed; she plants a poisonous snake in his tub and waits for it to kill Adrian as he bathes. But, somehow they begin to fight and she is pulled in and is killed instead. Adrian fakes a letter by Cordelia saying she left the ranch and will never return. Natalia takes this badly and gets ill. Afraid that question will arise, Adrian asks Carlota, on Cordelia's part through another fake letter, if she could take her place once more because Natalia is sick. Carlota agrees despite her growing love and hate towards Alvaro, the man who made a fool of her years ago. She leaves for Alvaro's ranch, missing her bus, which later crashes--and her name is on the dead-victims list. Bernarda finds out her daughter is "dead", and she cannot collect the inheritance unless a body is found. Carlota takes her place as Cordelia, the strict lady of the ranch, but her loving, compassionate personality often surfaces, making others suspect she is another woman. Carlota faces many challenges and lies; she discovers her nephew is alive and lives in the town, truth about her mother, and convincing everyone she is Cordelia. Will her hate over Alvaro triumph and keep on focused on her goal to get Natalia better then divorce him as Cordelia, or will she slowly let her guard down and reveal she is not Cordelia but the other? Or will her mother find her and reveal to everyone who she is?