A Matter of ‘Honor’ : Recent Latino Films Are One-Sided, Depicting a Violent Culture, Critics Say

“Bound by Honor,” which opens in Los Angeles today, follows 14 months after the release of “American Me,” a similarly violent story of young lives ruined by gangs, drugs and prison warfare. Along with last year’s “Mambo Kings,” a melodrama about two Cuban musicians, they are the only recent major studio releases with Latino subjects.

And that has touched a nerve among Latino filmmakers and scholars, who say they are tired of seeing only the underbelly of their community depicted on film.

At a time when films by and about African-Americans seem to be proliferating, Latinos are dismayed to find there have been few inroads for them. Complaining that Hollywood has little interest in the lives of ordinary Latinos or their culture and rich literature, Latino filmmakers say they have to struggle for funding from sources like the National Endowment for the Humanities in order to get their stories told.

Several of the films they single out for praise--including “The Ballad of Gregorio Cortez” (1982), “El Norte” (1983) and “Stand and Deliver” (1987)--were partly funded by the Public Broadcasting System’s “American Playhouse.”

Despite the critical and commercial success of the modestly budgeted “El Norte” and “Stand and Deliver,” the films’ respective directors, Gregory Nava and Ramon Menendez, did not see their careers take off. Even the better-known Luis Valdez, director of the hit 1987 film “La Bamba,” has been unable to get studio financing for a film biography of artist Frida Kahlo.

By showing only one segment of Latino life, these critics say, Hollywood studios are not only behaving irresponsibly and wasting money on box-office bombs; they are also missing out on a potentially sizable audience--Latinos make up 9% of the U.S. population--that only rarely sees their own lives represented on the screen. “American Me” cost an estimated $16 million to make and grossed $13.1 million domestically, while “Bound by Honor,” which was budgeted at $20 million, had taken in $2.6 million through Sunday (the last figure made available by Disney). Both are considered commercial failures by studio standards.

“That means they have to consider doing another genre than this one, which has been beaten to death,” said Menendez.

Like many of his fellow filmmakers, Menendez said Hollywood’s perspective is limited by the absence of Latinos in senior studio positions and its failure to recognize that Latinos do not live in a monolithic community. “L.A.’s gang problems are not of interest to Latinos in other parts of the country,” he said.

Last summer, when New Line Cinema abandoned plans to finance his Kahlo film, Valdez, referring to “Bound by Honor” and “American Me,” said: “How is it that Hollywood is prepared to spend $50 million on gangbangers, but is not prepared to spend less than a fifth of that to tell the story of two Mexican geniuses (Kahlo and her artist-husband Diego Rivera) who lived and loved and struggled together?”

*

Earlier this week Valdez announced that he has revived the Kahlo film by turning to independent financing. Asked about the state of Latino-themed films, he said: “What I object to are stories that are completely negative and stereotypical. Most Hispanic families are quite functional.”

Directed by “La Bamba” producer Taylor Hackford, “Bound by Honor” opened in 30 cities around the country on April 30, but Disney officials, nervous about possible outbreaks of violence, announced during deliberations in the Rodney G. King beating case that the film’s Los Angeles debut would be postponed. No incidents have occurred since a confrontation last February outside a Las Vegas theater where the film, then titled, “Blood In, Blood Out,” was being test screened.

If Hollywood had a more balanced and varied view of Latinos, some filmmakers say, there would be fewer objections to films like “American Me,” directed by and starring Edward James Olmos, and “Bound by Honor,” whose screenplay was co-written by essayist and poet Jimmy Santiago Baca, a former prison inmate.

“Taylor Hackford is a person of integrity. It’s perfectly fine for him to make a film like ‘Bound by Honor,’ ” said filmmaker and television writer Jesus Trevino (“Roots of Blood”), who, like most of those interviewed for this article, had not yet seen the film. “But when seen in overall perspective, it’s unfortunate that there are not more films across the board being made, other than this plethora of gang films . . . You would think that every Chicano is a gang member, and that’s certainly not the case.”

Neither Hackford nor Disney officials were willing to respond to the filmmakers’ allegations that Hollywood stereotypes Latinos.

While some in the community are critical of both Olmos and Hackford, others credit them with sincere intentions--in Olmos’ case, to make a cautionary tale for barrio youth, and in Hackford’s, to create an epic Chicano saga.

*

Until the late 1970s Hollywood virtually Ignored the Chicano experience. The first major film about Chicanos was Universal’s 1979 “Walk Proud,” which sparked an uproar among Latinos because it starred a white actor--Robby Benson--as a Chicano gang member who falls in love with a white woman. Benson wore contact lenses to make his blue eyes appear brown. The same year a second gang film set in East Los Angeles, “Boulevard Nights,” was viewed as a step forward since it featured Chicano actors; nevertheless it was also criticized for again portraying Latinos in a negative light.

One of those critics was Moctesuma Esparza, who became the leading Latino producer with such pictures as “The Ballad of Gregorio Cortez” and “Milagro Beanfield War” (1988). When “Walk Proud” was being filmed, Esparza had just co-produced the first film ever directed by a Chicano in the United States--the low-budget “Only Once in a Lifetime,” about an East L.A. artist--and was unable to find a distributor.

Today, Esparza and other Latino filmmakers say they often get a good reception from studios until the question of casting arises.

“They say, ‘Yes, this is a wonderful script but bring me a star,’ ” said Esparza. At present, Andy Garcia and Raul Julia are the only Latino actors who are widely considered “bankable.” No Latina actresses are believed to exert an equivalent box-office draw. As a result, Valdez himself was the object of protest last year when he decided to cast Laura San Giacomo, who is not a Latina, as Kahlo. Perhaps to placate critics, he has reconceptualized his film as “The Two Fridas” and now hopes to hire both Giacomo and Mexican actress Ofelia Medina.

Nava, who also blames “casting hurdles” for Hollywood’s lack of interest in his Latino-centered proposals, said, “Since ‘El Norte’ I could have done five wonderful movies.” Instead, he made the poorly received “A Time of Destiny,” a 1988 drama starring William Hurt as the black sheep son of a Basque immigrant.

“The industry was poised to break for black filmmakers, but not for Latinos,” Nava said. “They weren’t wanting that. They weren’t ready for that.”

While some members of Nava’s generation--he is in his 40s--feel stymied, a few younger filmmakers report happier experiences in Hollywood. Robert Rodriguez, 25, struck a two-year writing and directing deal at Columbia Pictures when his $7,000-action-adventure story, “El Mariachi,” caught the eye of Stephanie Allain, the development executive who helped launch the career of “Boyz N the Hood” director John Singleton. An African-American, Allain is one of a handful of minority studio executives.

Rodriguez expects to begin production this summer on a sequel to “El Mariachi” and also plans to make a comedy based on his short film, “Deadhead,” about a Mexican-American family of 10 children very much like the one in which he was raised.

“I’ve been handed movies about gangs, and I said, ‘That’s not really what I like to do,” said Rodriguez. “If (Bound by Honor) doesn’t do well financially, it will only be better for us in the future.”

Nancy De Los Santos was able to make a 30-minute film, “Breaking Pan with Sol,” about a Latina celebrating her 30th birthday, as a result of a 5-year-old program at Universal Television designed to encourage new Latino filmmaking talent. Each year, from 60 to 80 people compete for two slots in the program. “They deserve all the credit in the world,” she said, referring to Universal.

But at the same time, Universal Pictures decided not to make a $5-million film based on a script it developed from “The Perez Family,” Christine Bell’s novel about a couple who find love in the wake of the Mariel boat lifts from Cuba. The film is now in development at the Samuel Goldwyn Co., with Mira Nair (“Mississippi Masala”) expected to direct it.

Now in post-production are two independent films financed in part by “American Playhouse” that have yet to find distributors for their pre-television theatrical release. Directed by Severo Perez, “And the Earth Did Not Swallow Him,” is based on the 1971 stream-of-consciousness novel by the late UC Riverside chancellor Tomas Rivera. Told from the perspective of a migrant child of the 1950s, it is regarded as the first book to give literary voice to the Chicano community.

The other film, co-produced by KCET and “American Playhouse” is “Roosters,” starring Olmos and Sonia Braga. Derived from Milcha Sanchez-Scott’s play of the same name, it deals with the clash of values between a Mexican-American man newly released from prison and his family.

More optimistic than most, Rodriguez believes that black director Spike Lee, by financing his own breakthrough film “She’s Gotta Have It” (1986) on his own, set a model that Latino filmmakers can follow. “It started slow, it didn’t happen on its own,” said the youthful director, referring to the growth of black filmmaking. “We’ve got to do it ourselves. We’ve got to go out and make our own movies.”

*

Times staff writer David J. Fox contributed to this article.

* LOST IN EAST L.A.: “Bound by Honor” is sincere but cliched. Kenneth Turan’s review. F14