Latino Images in Film

by Berg, Charles Ramirez

• ISBN13: 9780292709065
• ISBN10: 0292709064
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2002-09-01
• Publisher: Univ of Texas Pr

Summary

"This book fills a void in bringing together Hollywood stereotyping and Latino self-representation in one study. With clarity and insight, Berg demonstrates why it is so important to take such an approach."--Chon Noriega, author of Shot in America: Television, the State, and the Rise of Chicano CinemaThe bandido, the harlot, the male buffoon, the female clown, the Latin lover, and the dark lady--these have been the defining, and demeaning, images of Latinos in U.S. cinema for more than a century. In this book, Charles Ramírez Berg develops an innovative theory of stereotyping that accounts for the persistence of such images in U.S. popular culture. He also explores how Latino actors and filmmakers have actively subverted and resisted such stereotyping.In the first part of the book, Berg sets forth his theory of stereotyping, defines the classic stereotypes, and investigates how actors such as Raúl Julia, Rosie Pérez, José Ferrer, Lupe Vélez, and Gilbert Roland have subverted stereotypical roles. In the second part, he analyzes Hollywood' portrayal of Latinos in three genres: social problem films, John Ford westerns, and science fiction films. In the concluding section, Berg looks at Latino self-representation and anti-stereotyping in Mexican American border documentaries and in the feature films of Robert Rodríguez. He also presents an exclusive interview in which Rodríguez talks about his entire career, from Bedhead to Spy Kids, and comments on the role of a Latino filmmaker in Hollywood and how he tries to subvert the system.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments	xi
Introduction	1	(10)
PART ONE THEORY	11	(172)
Categorizing the Other
Stereotypes and Stereotyping	13	(25)
Stereotypes in Film	38	(28)
A Crash Course on Hollywood's Latino Imagery	66	(45)
Subversive Acts
Latino Actor Case Studies	87	(22)
PART TWO THE HOLLYWOOD VERSION
Latino Representation in Mainstream Cinema	109	(2)
Bordertown, the Assimilation Narrative, and the Chicano Social Problem Film	111	(72)
The Margin as Center
The Multicultural Dynamics of John Ford's Westerns	128	(25)
Immigrants, Aliens, and Extraterrestrials
Science Fiction's Alien ``Other'' as (among Other Things) New Hispanic Imagery	153	(30)
PART THREE LATINO SELF-REPRESENTATION	183	(90)
Backstory
Chicano and Latino Filmmakers behind the Camera	185	(5)
El Genio Del Genero
Mexican American Borderland Documentaries and Postmodernism	190	(29)
Ethnic Ingenuity and Mainstream Cinema
Robert Rodriguez's Bedhead (1990) and El Mariachi (1993)	219	(21)
The Mariachi Aesthetic Goes to Hollywood
An Interview with Robert Rodriguez	240	(22)
CONCLUSION
The End of Stereotypes?	262	(11)
Notes	273	(32)
Index	305