Ken Burns Hates Mexicans

The Films of Efrain Gutierrez

Here’s how you make a no-budget narrative feature film:

Spend a year writing and rewriting a screenplay. About 100 pages or so. Don’t pay yourself. Organize about 30 friends to show up at 6 AM to work ten hour days. Persuade them to do this for free. Next, convince total strangers to let these 30 or so friends into their home or place of business to use their living room as a movie set. Again, for free.

Repeat every day for two or three weeks. It’s a wrap. Congratulations, you are now 1/3 of the way done. You now have to edit the film, prevail upon musician friends to donate songs for the soundtrack, for free, and dodge creditors.

Did I mention? It’s the mid 1970s. There is no such thing as HD video. No Final Cut Pro. No websites with handy low-budget production tips. Instead, dozens of rolls of 16mm film have to be shipped to a lab hundreds of miles away for processing. If that living room scene comes out too dark (or not exposed at all), too bad, you cannot afford to reshoot. There is no Fed Ex. No Sundance premiere as mythic goal justifying it all. No cell phones to wake oversleeping actors.

Imagine making this feature length film with no training, no PBS grants, and no rich uncles. Indie role models to emulate don’t exist yet: Spike Lee is still in Junior High; Jim Jarmusch not yet in film school; Slacker, and the so-called birth of the American independent film movement, still 15 years off. You have no choice but to invent DIY cinema as you stumble along.

All you know for certain, from the very beginning of your long strange trip, is this simple fact: At the end of the day, at the end of your struggles, Hollywood will not buy your movie. It will not screen in mainstream theaters. It will never play on TV. You are Chicano. They are not interested in your life. You live in the West Side of San Antonio. Your subject matter is the inner-city community around you.

This simple fact does not deter you.

To get fellow raza to see your film -- and they will, by the thousands -- you will have to pack your single, precious movie print, all that you could afford, into the trunk of your car and drive the countless miles from Texas to California, renting theaters along the way, charging tickets at the door. You eke out a profit. You are exhausted. Your personal life in shambles.

You do this again. Three times in five years.

Welcome to the world of independent filmmaker Efrain Gutierrez.

"We Are America"

One of the highlights of this weekend's National Association of Independent Producer's conference (a high point, of course, rivaling the sight of a famous director -- who shall remain unnamed -- doing the Worm on the dance floor) was the inspiring speech filmmaker and playwright Luis Valdez delivered at the Friday luncheon.

Well, at least I was told it was one of the highlights. I arrived late to the conference on that Friday afternoon, and my only viewing of the great Luis Valdez was watching the director of the classic film La Bamba carrying his luggage out of the hotel. And for those of you wondering, I can safely report the vato tipped the valets well so my high esteem of the Chicano icon remains high. Even more impressive? The valets were all white dudes. It was that fancy a hotel. You don't seen that demographic represented amongst the usual raza-filled occupation.

But I digress. Back to the speech. NALIP has uploaded an mp3 of the Luiz Valdez here. Historical. Inspirational. Political. It is very badass.

Included above is part I of Valdez' first film, I Am Joaquin (1969), based on the poem by Corky Gonzales.

Video of the Day

If you're in L.A. or New York go see this movie. Very badass.

Make Brown Film

Your intrepid blogger here, just back from Newport Beach, California, and the 10th annual National Association of Latino Producers (Nalip) 10th annual conference. For those raza unaware of Newport Beach it's a rich-ass city in Orange County, a city best know for a mall called Fashion Island, one-time home of NBA badboy and ex-Spurs Dennis Rodman, and, according to wikipedia as of October 2008, a city whose political demographics broke down into "35,870 registered Republicans and 13,850 registered Democrats" Nuff said.

For those raza unaware of Nalip, it's a membership organization of independent film and TV producers, which is a polite way of saying it's a membership organization of filmmakers who can't get their work funded, broadcasted, or respected. It's like a gathering of Brown Rodney Dangerfield's, networking about, but using Spanglish in their punchlines, dependent, usually, on various uses of the word "pendejo."

Highlights of the conference was spotting Luis Valdez schlepping  his own luggage (a reminder that our Chicano icons are indeed mortal); the screening of Alex Rivera's new sci-fi movie Sleep Dealer (ok, I didn't actualy SEE the Nalip screening -- but I've seen the movie twice already -- just dropped in for Alex's Q and A, which was funny despite homeboy never using the word "pendejo"); I also like visiting old friends, and last but not least, getting a personally autographed copy of Josefina Lopez's new novel, Hungry Woman in Paris.

As part of the 10th anniversay program the organzers  invited writers to talk about an issue or event that has been significant to making Brown film in the last 10 years. I wrote about my anoyance with the narrow minded tendency by execs and film writers to expect any Latino film to automatically be a film about immigration. I coulda wrote more but they only gave me a 1000 words. Read it after the jump...Oh, and the pic of the groovy guy in the dapper hat and cool shade I'm including as conference photo? That's legendary underground Latino filmmaker Gustavo Stebner strking a pose.

We're Number One?

According to Variety, number one movie in the United States this weekend is Beverly Hills Chihuahua. Not sure if I should laugh or cry. I'll reserve judgement until I see the movie. And, yes, it's on my list of To Dos this week, along with the season premier of The Real Housewives of Atlanta.

But back to the dog movie: there must be some kind of cultural analysis to glean from a movie about how a "real" Mexican chihuahua (voice by George Lopez) somehow gets the gringa, inauthentic Chihuahua (voice  by Drew Barrymore) to get in touch with her Mexican roots via a trip to the Motherland. Sounds like a movie Latinos who care about such things should be lining up to see. It even has Edward James Olmos in it. Talk about your Chicano bonafides.

But again, will get back to you after a viewing. Like I said, I watch these things so you don't have to. Until then, here's the first of what I'm sure will be many parodies to come...

Some Kind of Raza

My favorite moment in the Metallica documentary Some Kind of Monster was when Lars, James, and Kirk told Robert Trujillo he would be the legendary band's new bass player. A reaction shot of the exuberant Trujillo, literally jumping around in delight like a ten year old kid, demonstrated the joyous power of rock and roll, never mind the heaviness of metal, or the menacing, hulking, beefy, Brown, long-haired metal musician.

Prior to his current Metallica gig, Trujillo was  best known as the bass player for the Venice hardcore/punk band Suicidal Tendencies, a distinctly L.A. group where lead singer Mike Muir often dressed like a cholo. As the band's second bass player, Trujillo fucking rocked on Suicidal's post-punk, metal thrash period, and the influence of Trujillo's funk based leanings clearly heard on the band's then evolving sound. 

Yesterday the new inductees for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame were introduced. Metallica was among them. There will plenty of time in the future to debate the merits of the band's inclusion, but for now, let us praise Roberto Agustin Trujillo, a Mexican American in the Hall of Fame.

So go here to see the audition sequence from Some Kind of Monster. Highly, highly recommended, not only as great documentary filmmaking, but an insightful discussion by Lars et al which articulates the unique musical and technical bass stylings of Trujillo. And I leave you with a clip of a Trujillo bass solo, an extended opening of Metallica's For Whom the Bell Tolls. Classic.

UPDATE: Ooops. My bad. It seems I jumped the gun. An astute reader has corrected me on my error. The RNR Hall of Fame list, of which Metallica is only one of the nine names, are the nominees. Not the five inductees. They will be announced later. So let's keep a vela lit for Mr. Trujillo. And also for fellow nominee War, of Lowrider fame.

Same As It Ever Was #103

Sex in the City beat out Indiana Jones for biggest movie in America this past weekend. $55 million, 85% of the ticket buyers female. Apparently the big numbers took Hollywood execs by surprise. Interesting post over at Vulture, which not only analyzes the industry's reluctance to acknowledge women as a valued market, but pronounces Carrie, Samantha, Miranda, and Charlotte as Superheroes (because they protect each other from bad men.) Clever...

Hollywood's mystified response to Sex and the City's $55 million opening weekend — who knew women liked to see movies with their friends? — proves once again that despite being more than half the population, women are still a niche market in the movie business. After helpfully identifying which moviegoers contributed to SATC's success ("women"), bewildered Hollywood number-counter Paul Dergarabedian added, "This was to women what Indiana Jones and Star Wars, let's say, are to men." The only people who aren't surprised at SATC's summer-blockbuster numbers are women.

Still -- Superheros they may be -- but Carrie & Company's Marvel Universe of New York City has always been pretty much white, devoid of brown people, in no way even a meek reflection of the city's actual cultural and ethnic diversity. Apparently (I have yet to see the movie -- and, yes, I'm gonna -- I'm a big fan of the so-called, much maligned chick flick) the film version of SATC attempts to rectify the retro gringo TV fantasy with the best way Hollywood knows how: the sassy black girlfriend. As posted in the Root...

After six seasons, a couple of power lesbians, a naked Blair Underwood, contract negotiations, false starts and four years of abstinence, the city will finally get some color in the full-figured form of Jennifer Hudson.

The 26-year-old Oscar winner will play a new character—little Louise from St. Louis, Carrie's "young and inexperienced, but still label-savvy assistant." Booooo!

All Sex and the City evangelists know there is one fatal flaw with the show that launched the sale of a thousand Manolos; The New York City that HBO gave us was monochromatic, lily white. Unless you count bright spots with Miranda's former lovah Dr. Robert Leeds (Blair Underwood) and a few lipstick lesbians who showed Charlotte a good time in season two, SATC has never been the place to seek affirmative action in bed.

The black best friend, of course, nothing new. And, as always, serving a particular servile function, with no agency all their own, not to mention an individual storyline. As The Root continues in their blog...

Still, Hudson's character, though fresh-faced, unexpected and significant, appears to be fairly predictable. Louise, with her curly black 'do and dizzy plaid boots, has a specific function in the film—helping Carrie get her crap together after a bad break up. Basically she is the perfect pocket life coach.

Again, nothing new. Referenced in the Root post is this must-read LA Times article from last year by Gregg Braxton, which delves deeper into the Black Best Friend. Braxton describes the phenom as a second banana character "played by an African American actress whose character’s principal function is to support the heroine, often with sass, attitude and a keen insight into relationships and life." This would be comical if it wasn't so sad. Again, from Braxton's piece...

But on a more serious note, the trend of BBFs underscores the limitations that African American actresses still face more than five years after Halle Berry's Oscar-winning performance as best actress in a leading role for “Monster’s Ball.” Despite impressive r�sum�s, solid credentials and successful achievements, many of the black actresses who have played BBFs are rarely offered the heroine role in mainstream projects. Not one black actress will star in a prime-time series on the four major networks this fall season.

And, as has been long lamented, lead roles in films are few and far between.

Over on the Latina front, all things representational aren't any better. Actually, they're worse. At least black actresses get parts in movies. Brown people can't even get them made.

Writer Alicia Valdes-Rodriguez, for example, has been trying to get her book The Dirty Girl's Social Club made into a Hollywood movie. Her script of her novel was sent by her producers to all the major studios. All of them passed on the project. And she has a few opinions of why it happened. In the latest of her series of video posts updating her fans on the project's development, Valdes-Rodriguez blames ignorance by "the studio execs" (read "rich white guys") on their lack of interest in the project. Seems the myopic bastards were put off with what Valdes-Rodriguez claims are her complex Latina characters (read "latinas who are not maids.") The execs, apparently, could not read them as "real latinas." Whatever that means.

It's a seven minute semi-rant, not without its salient points. See video here. And I was with V-R on more than a few of her arguments until homegirl touted Greg Nava's recent straight-to-video mess movie Borderland as "great." An example of a model Hollywood Latino project? A movie brown filmmakers should aspire to emulate? Hm. I rented Borderland. And it was bad. Nothing more than the corny Nava cinematic aesthetic coupled with a self-indulgent, self-congratulatory, exploitive J Lo star vehicle draped over the real horrors of the murders of the young women of Juarez. Not to mention its meandering and confusing plot and bad "noble" acting. If this is the epitome of Brown Film give me Cheech and Chong any day.

Perhaps -- and this doesn't necessarily apply to Dirty Girls Social Club (I haven't read it, nor have I read the screenplay) -- but perhaps Hollywood is turning down Latino scripts because they are just not good. Granted, a legitimate complaint on a double standard can be made given Hollywood's daily greenlighting of bad white movies, but I'd like to think our standards should be higher than, say, the latest Adam Sandler movie. I'm just sayin'.

Apologies for the long post. But if you've read this far I'm sure you won't mind a last couple of paragraphs, especially if its an example of some good writing, a welcome palate-cleansing change of pace after the Greg Nava bad moviemaking detour. Again, from the Vulture post, about the the Sex in the City girls as Superheroes, and the double standard applied to chick flicks...

Superheroes exist outside the laws and boundaries the rest of us have to abide by; while men want to see themselves flying and fighting, women are more interested in pushing other limits. How old can you be and still be hot? How many times can you break up and still be in love with someone? How many hours of the day can four working women conceivably spend together?

Pointing out that Carrie could never afford her apartment, let alone her wardrobe, is about as useful as questioning Robert Downey Jr.'s ability to create cold fusion in a cave in Afghanistan — it misses the point of the movie entirely. Why is it okay for Iron Man to collect expensive cars but materialistic for Carrie to collect shoes? Surely her carbon footprint is the smaller of the two. Politely, we don't ask what the Hulk says about American men and their relationship to rage, so why should we tolerate attacks on Samantha's legendary libido? Sam Jones is no more a real cougar than Dr. Jones is a real archaeologist, but they're both good summer fun. So wise up, Hollywood, and start giving us some more female superheroes. And please, take a hint from Sex and the City, and dress them in Vivienne Westwood, not vinyl.

As Stan "the Man" Lee would put it, "'Nuff said."

Postcard From Grungelandia

Was away for the past three days in Seattle giving a presentation at the Experience Music Project's Pop Conference, an annual gathering of music critics talking about all things cultural, musical, and pop. Amazing time, in an admitted geeky fan boy kind of way. Best part of the weekend was meeting two of my heroes, Griel Marcus, who's idea of Lipstick Traces led me to apply his theory of Secret Histories oh-so-appropriately to U.S. Latinos, and my main man Greg Tate, who's seminal book of essays on Black culture and music, Flyboy in the Buttermilk, taught me how to be a better post-Chicano. I've been carrying around my tattered paperback of Tate's book for almost fourteen years now freely appropriating vato's still radical ideas on race and culture.

Allow me to quote from a piece I wrote on Latino filmmaking for the San Francisco Bay Guardian many years ago (full article here). The essay not only distills Tate's particular ideas on fusing specific ethnic sensibilities with "white" influences to create something new, but also gives a snapshot of the sad state of Latino filmmaking eight or nine years ago. But even more lamentable? The situation of Raza cinema hasn't improved much since then. Oh well, at least we had Elisa Jimenez from Project Runway last year and, of course, Alex Rivera's upcoming post-border sci-fi epic, Sleep Dealer. Punto!

It is with some irony, then, that I turn to the ideas of the one African American writer who most captures the emerging hybrid sensibility/strategy of a new post-movimiento generation of Latino filmmakers, and future of brown film.

There is a patented, vertiginous moment in a Greg Tate essay ("Cult Nats Meet Freaky-Deke") where the self-described Flyboy in the Buttermilk expounds in his usual dizzying and apt rhetoric on a liberating aesthetic current among certain enlightened Black artists. He talks about those anti-essentialist folks who "feel secure enough about Black culture to claim art produced by nonblacks as part of their inheritance." (Substitute “black” for “brown” in the above quote and it sounds like many contemporary U.S. Latinos.) A 150 plus word litany then ensues where the provocative writer headbumps pairings of seminal influential artist types as evidence of his theory of how seemingly disparate cultural influences actually make cogent sense when incorporated by certain enlightened black artists.

Just a sampling from Señor Tate’s intentionally contradictory two-page list: "...George Clinton and George Romero, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Lisette Model, Zora Neale Hurston and Akira Kurosawa...Jah Rastafari and Johnny Rotten...Anthony Braxton and Bruce Lee...Antonin Artaud and Amira Baraka...Fredric Jameson and Reverend James Cleveland," and on and on and on.

Absent, of course, in Tate's glib Who's Who are any American artists of the Brown variety. Now I mention this not so much to dis brother Tate (OK, maybe just a little -- those who preach post-modern pastiche, after all, should practice it) but more so because the guy's on to something.

“...Malcolm X and Jimi Hendrix...?”

That’s cool. But how about certain Chicano/Latino artists that also easily navigate and reference and knowingly subvert all that pop America -- North and South -- has to offer.  Take Luis M. Meza's sublime 1996 ultra low budget feature, Staccato Purr of the Exhaust. In that very cool ultra low budget feature Meza mixes the influences of Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Jim Jarmusch, and lo-fi rock and roll into a new American idie film sensibility.

The point being, of course, not to lay down some unproductive one-up-manship in referencology with African American artists -- 'cause Prince Paul or the RZA would totally kick our Latino ass in that kind of sampling mano-a-mano -- no, what matters here is illustrating just another example of the culturally specific, all-encompassing power of mestizaje -- our people's predeliction for hybridity and mixing -- our necessary mastery of two cultures -- the creation of a natural brown aesthetic informing our movies. It's a distinct creative strategy that's worked in the past, and being transformed for the future.

Will be posting more details and observations the next few days on all the things Latino and pop and relevant I encountered at the conference. Not to mention pontifications on Alberto "The Geneva Convention is Quaint" Gonzales' job search (no one wants to hire him); the Spurs loss to the hated Lakers (we'll get 'em in the playoffs); and a response to a way fucked up review by a clueless gringo critic writing on the Phantom Sightings show. Stay tuned...

From Back in the Day

Doh! Just discovered I can actually embed clips from my Myspace page to this blog. Badass. Have been wanting to post my first film, Pretty Vacant (16mm, Black and White, 33 1.3 min), in several segments over the course of a few weeks for your viewing pleasure...you know, serial narrative like, a la Charles Dickens, only San Antonio instead of London and Sex Pistol's lyricis instead of "These were the best of times, the worst of times."

Anyway, like I said, this was my first movie, finished in 1996, starring my friend Mariana Vasquez, shot entirely inside Loop 410 San Antonio, Texas, it won some awards, I corresponded with Griel Marcus because of the movie (didn't actually meet him, though), and features songs by Velocity Girl, Esteban Jordan, Freddy Fender, and Cafe Tacuba, among many others. The story's about a girl in a punk band called Aztlan-A-Go-Go, her name is Molly, every summer her family goes back to Mexico to visit the relatives but this time she doesn't want to go because she's convinced she's stumbled across something that will change the very foundation of rock history. Something to do with the Sex Pistol's infamous 1978 gig in San Antonio. It'll all make sense when you watch the movie. Anyway, here's the opening. More clips in the weeks to come.

Pretty Vacant - Opening

Same As It Ever Was...

Of interest for that small subset of "Those Latinos Who Care About Such Things" (meaning that subset of raza who also care about box office numbers...perhaps all five of us) the numbers for the new immigrant movie La Misma Luna ("Under the Same Moon") has broken a record. Apparently someone's been keeping track of "three day opening weekend grosses for Spanish language films" and La Misma Luna's $2.8 million shattered the previous benchmark.

This category of "three day opening weekend grosses of Spanish language films" is, of course, not to be confused with "films that feature evil one-dimensional gringo characters" or even "films which feature assimilated Chicano characters who don't speak Spanish and act like idiots." Both categories of movies which La Misma Luna would certainly qualify. Not to say I didn't like the movie -- I did -- let's just say the film never met a convenient and coincidental plot point it didn't like.

Two weeks ago I attended the conference of the National Association of Independent Latino Filmmakers. A membership group of U.S. Latino filmmakers from across the country. Highlights of this year's annual event featured a special screening of La Misma Luna on Friday night; an opening plenary session with a lone U.S. Latino among four Mexicans discussing "Creating a Pan-Latino Cinema With Global Appeal," and two special luncheon conversations sponsored by HBO with the makers of the joint Mexico/Spain co-production Pan's Labyrinth on Saturday, and on Sunday Carlos Cuaron discussing his upcoming soccer movie starring the Matt Damon and Ben Affleck of the Latino world, Diego Luna and Gail Garcia Bernal.

If you're detecting a non-U.S. Latino theme in these signature events in a conference dedicated to the efforts of U.S. Latino filmmakers striving for cultural self-expression you're not the only one to notice. And while this isn't so much a critique of the organizers of the NALIP conference -- after all, you can only reflect what's out there in the marketplace -- what's happening is that more and more the notion of what defines a "Latino" film, especially to studios and/or white producers, is that a Latino movie has to be about immigrants and has to be in Spanish. Absent from this narrow view of contemporary Brown life is anything deviating from the stories of humble maids and busboys, intrepid border crossings, the dreaded migra, and "lessons to be learned from it all."

From a must read post on writer Alisa Valdez-Rodriguez's blog:

In 2007, Touchstone Pictures pulls the plug on "Deep in the Heart of Texas," a feature film starring Eva Longoria, about a fully assimilated Mexican American woman, saying there is nothing particularly "Latina" about an educated, professional shopaholic from Texas; meaning, the character is "too American" for audiences to believe as "Latina". (Meanwhile, Texas is no longer a majority-white state, and most Latinos there speak English…)

While Eva Longoria wouldn't be my first choice to articulate the complexity of raza life circa 2008, you get the picture. Hollywood's probably the only place in America where an illegal immigration status is beneficial for career advancement. As my friend filmmaker Alex Rivera (The Sleep Dealer -- see NYT mention here) says, we're in a crisis here. By my admittedly off the top of my head reckoning there has only been one indie and/or major studio release by a U.S. Latino filmmaker in the last five years -- and that's only if you're generous and count Kenny Ortega's High School Muscial 2. (Which I actually did, in this earlier post.)

In any case here's the La Misma Luna trailer. I saw the film at the $14 a seat Arclight Theater in Hollywood. Never saw so many Latinos in the hoity toity place. There's no question a market exists. And judging by the positive audience reaction the movie succeeds on an emotional  level, despite the clumsy and on the nose storytelling. And the acting's not bad. Especially Mexican comic actor Eugenio Derbez. Even the kid was ok -- at intervals. Like with most child actors, you alternate between wanting to throttle the cloying brat or chuckle at his precociousness. Me, it was hard getting past the kid's neatly combed hair. Kept reminded me of a midget Mitt Romney. Anyway, judge for yourself. And go buy a ticket. Who knows? Maybe some enlightened studio exec will be motivated by the box office numbers and greenlight something more interesting. If so, I got a couple of scripts to show him or her. Until then...