Judging films, like judging art, music, literature or your favorite pozole recipe, is strictly a subjective exercise.
Written by Roberto Leal
I’m an insomniac. Oftentimes, during an all too frequent sleepless night, I’ll watch a movie on TCM in the wee hours of the morning. I’ve come to refer to these pre-dawn, movie-watching episodes as Insomniac Cinema.
Last week — could have been last night or last year. Who knows? Who cares? All the days seem to blend into a series of dissolves from one scene to another. Anyway, I was watching Alfred Hitchcock’s Vertigo, (1957), starring Jimmy Stewart and Kim Novak.
When Vertigo initially appeared in movie houses, it was universally bitch-slapped by movie critics for its lurid subject matter of obsession and control. What was most disturbing, at the time, was Hollywood’s beloved good guy, Jimmy Stewart played the obsessed, control freak.
Vertigo met its “Dark Fate”, at the box office, almost as quickly as the latest Terminator flick. However, over the years, Vertigo gained cache and stature with film scholars, as Hitchcock’s masterpiece surprisingly found itself displacing Orson Welles’ Citizen Kane in the #1 spot as the greatest film of all-time.
The prestigious British film journal, Sight & Sound, which most recently issue of The 100 Greatest Films list, still has Vertigo at #1. But as I checked through this most recent list, I found a glaring sin of omission: NOT ONE, nada niguno, Spanish-language or Chicano film from either the USA, Mexico, Central or South America or the Latin Caribbean made the list. Querido amigos!
To quote the Freddy Fender Texas Tornado national anthem of San Antonio, “Hey, Baby, Que Pasó?” How could this be possible? It was as if the voting film pundits were totally unaware of the huge land mass, between the shores of the British Isles and the beaches of Japan, teeming with talented Latino filmmakers, directors, actors, screenwriters and technicians.
I have no qualms with films like Touch of Evil, Bicycle Thieves, The 400 Blows, Persona, Casablanca, Singing in the Rain, or even Douglas Sirk’s weepy melodrama, Imitation of Life (which starred Lana Turner and John Gavin who was of Mexican ancestry), being on the list. Who the hell doesn’t bawl like a baby in the final scene when Juanita Moore’s long-suffering, heart-of-gold character dies? Without fail, I always do. Hold on, gotta get a tissue. I tear up just thinking about that scene.
Judging films like judging art, music, literature or your favorite pozole recipe, is strictly a subjective exercise. Beauty in art or film is in the eye of the beholder, just as great pozole is on the tongue of the taster.
Let me offer up three objectively excellent Latino cinematic gems worthy of consideration to be added onto the list of The 100 Greatest Films:
Soy Cuba, (Cuba), 1964 Directed by Mikhail Kalatozov. This Cuban/Russian co-production takes you on a lyrical, poetic journey through pre-Castro Cuba by weaving together four vignettes of the different, and often conflicting socio-economic dynamics swirling on the island at that time. The camerawork, in Soy Cuba, is hypnotic. At times, the cameraseems to have wings as it floats seamlessly through sugar cane fields, within a smoke-filled Havana night club scene and soars up to balconies and rooftops and then swoops back down to street level. Ingmar Bergman observed, sitting in a dark theater watching the flickering images flashing on the screen at 24 frames per second, is the closest we come to replicating the dream state. Soy Cuba comes damn close.
Los Olvidados,(Mexico), 1950. Spanish filmmaker, Luis Buñuel, made several films in Mexico during that country’s Golden Age of Cinema, during the Forties and Fifties. Buñuel’s Los Olvidados is a bleak, uncompromising exploration of youth violence in the dark underbelly of Mexico City. This gritty, black and white Mexican film is the equal of any of its Italian Neo-Realism or French New Wave contemporaries.
Zoot Suit, (America), 1981. The son of migrant farm workers from Delano, California, Luis Valdez, playwright, actor, director,producer, is the acknowledged wellspring of Chicano cinema. His iconic film, Zoot Suit,based on his play, embodies what Luis Valdez is all about. Zoot Suit tells the story of the little-known Zoot Suit Wars of the Forties. It deftly examines the racial bias and struggles with cultural identity within the Chicano community. Zoot Suit features a tour de force performance by Latino legend, Edward James Olmos, as El Pachuco, the flamboyant, colorful conscience and spirit of Zoot Suit culture. Zoot Suit is a prime example of film auteurship, a quality lauded by film theorists.
[And a Few Editor Picks: Salt of the Earth (USA), El Norte (USA), Like Water For Chocolate (Mexico), Fresa Y Chocolate (Cuba), Official Story (Argentina)]
A NY Times article titled: Latinos Underappreciated in Hollywood, Study Finds, reports that regardless of critical and commercial success, Latinos still don’t get the much deserved and well-earned recognition in the entertainment industry like their non-Latino counterparts.
But, as Bob Dylan reminds us: “The times, they are a-changin”.
Today, Latinos are a commercial and creative force to be reckoned with in Hollywood and beyond. Whether film, TV, music, art or theater, people with Spanish surnames are becoming more commonplace, as the changing demographics of this huge land mass between the shores of the British Isles and the beaches of Japan, inexorably shift in our favor.
This year, the world’s biggest sports spectacle, the Super Bowl, will feature a halftime show with not one, but TWO Latina megadivas; Jennifer Lopez (USA) and Shakira (Colombia).
Five of the last six Oscars for Best Director have gone to Mexicans directors: Alejandro G. Iñárritu (Birdman, The Revenant), Alfonso Cuarón (Gravity, Roma), and Guillermo del Toro (The Shape of Water).
History is on our side. It won’t be long before film scholars begin to revisit, re-evaluate, appreciate and recognize the huge contributions of Latino filmmakers to the unique art of world cinema.
When the first Latino film, at long last, makes the list of The 100 Greatest Films, El Pachuco standing defiantly, decked out in his finest zoot suit duds, will snap his fingers and hoarsely whispers in his East LA Chicano accent: “¡Horale, ese! It’s about time.”