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Post by snsurone on Jan 21, 2018 0:59:34 GMT
Most of the time, they were portrayed as filthy, unshaven thugs in huge sombreros who were gun crazy and lusted after every white woman they encountered. Sometimes, they weren't even played by Latino actors; case in point: Walter Huston in THE BAD MAN, and Wallace Beery in VIVA VILLA. It wasn't until the 1970's that actor Ricardo Montalban (himself a Mexican) spearheaded a protest movement to force the entertainment industry to present a more fair portrayal of people south of the border. I remember one result of this movement was the end of TV commercials featuring "The Frito Bandito".
But when I watch reruns of old TV shows like GUNSMOKE, I still see some Mexicans as slimy pigs. I wonder if they're still pictured like that in current movies and TV shows.
The reason I'm bringing this subject up is because the orange baboon in the Oval Office appears to still harbor those ugly stereotypes.
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Post by Nalkarj on Jan 21, 2018 1:47:26 GMT
But how about all those many westerns in which they’re seen as kindly friends of the hero? Just one example: Pedro Gonzalez-Gonzalez, born to a Mexican mother and a Mexican-American father, in Rio Bravo.
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Post by Nalkarj on Jan 21, 2018 1:51:47 GMT
Or the great Pedro Armendáriz?
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Post by bravomailer on Jan 21, 2018 1:52:48 GMT
Katy Jurado in High Noon is a break from the stereotype you see.
Margo and Pedro Armendáriz also might not fit.
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Post by Doghouse6 on Jan 21, 2018 1:52:58 GMT
It wasn't until the 1970's that actor Ricardo Montalban (himself a Mexican) spearheaded a protest movement to force the entertainment industry to present a more fair portrayal of people south of the border. Given the late-'40s - early-'50s period of his term as an MGM contract player, Montalban managed an impressive collection of films in which his roles were of dignity, pride and intelligence; Border Incident, Mystery Street and Right Cross were excellent examples among them; even in frothy romances or musicals with Esther Williams, I never saw him play a role that was beneath him in terms of the way his nationality or ethnicity was portrayed. Whether this was a matter of good fortune or one of what would have been at the time an extraordinary ability to stand up to studio bosses in resisting demeaning parts, I cannot say. But I would like to think - and it wouldn't surprise me if true - that his own dignity, pride and intelligence had something to do with it.
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Post by Nalkarj on Jan 21, 2018 1:53:14 GMT
Or Dolores del Río?
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Post by bravomailer on Jan 21, 2018 2:07:39 GMT
Anthony Quinn might have played the roles you note early on, but in The Ox-Bow Incident he's the victim of a lynch mob and later played many honorable roles after that, of various ethnicities.
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Post by OldAussie on Jan 21, 2018 3:05:00 GMT
Charlton Heston is an unlikely looking Mexican but he's the hero......
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Post by OldAussie on Jan 21, 2018 3:19:01 GMT
I'll use this as an excuse for showing this great Katy Jurado scene
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Post by BATouttaheck on Jan 21, 2018 3:38:37 GMT
High Noon The Man from Del Rio
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Post by manfromplanetx on Jan 21, 2018 5:51:44 GMT
Believe it or not ? ... According to screen legend Mexican Emilio Fernández is the model for the Oscar statuette. The story goes that in 1928, MGM chief art director and Academy member Cedric Gibbons needed a model to help him design the look for a trophy. Famed Mexican actress and Hollywood star Dolores del Río close to Gibbons knew of the perfect guy, her friend, Emilio. A requirement before modelling Fernández had to be persuaded to pose nude, today the Mexican is revered as the "Oscar" , not the "Emilio." ... Emilio Fernandez was an outstanding Mexican film director, actor and screenwriter, he was one of the most prolific film directors of the famed Golden Age of Mexican cinema in the 1940s and 1950s and had some notable Hollywood acting and supervisory roles. La perla (1947) is an excellent film, the location setting is a Southern Mexican seaside village. Fernandez portrays a vivid insight, to the beauty, to the good, the bad and the ugly...
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Post by mikef6 on Jan 21, 2018 15:47:42 GMT
In Howard Hawk’s great film “Only Angels Have Wings” (1939), set in South America, Jean Arthur refers to the local language (Spanish) as “gibberish.” Mexican born actor Alphonso Bodoya (as Gold Hat in “The Treasure of the Sierra Madre”) speaks one of filmdom’s most famous and widely repeated lines. I won’t insult you by quoting it. I know you know it. BATouttaheck Thanks for the picture of Katy Jurado in “High Noon.” This is one of my top favorite supporting performances of all time. For a while, Jurado was married to, of all people, Ernest Borgnine. While married, they appeared together as a couple in the western caper film “The Badlanders” (1958). Not only were they married off-screen, but the warmth of their love affair came through to the audience. I thought it rather progressive for the time to show a successful Mexican/Anglo relationship in a standard western release (to a certain extent - They couldn't be allowed to live happily ever after).
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Post by BATouttaheck on Jan 21, 2018 15:59:28 GMT
mikef6Katy Jurado is sooooooo great in High Noon and that picture of her is to . When I was looking for Katy images I saw some with Borgnine. I didn't realize that he had been married to her. Shall have to watch for The Badlanders. Thanks for the recommend. Gold Hat ... one of THE GREATEST villains of all time! We used to use the line back on Prodigy where helpers were given "bad-jess"
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Post by snsurone on Jan 21, 2018 17:35:13 GMT
Did Dolores Del Rio ever play Mexican women? Seems to me that she mainly played Frenchwomen: Charmaine, Evangeline, Mme. DuBarry. And then there was the Polynesian girl who was sacrificed to a volcano.
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Post by bravomailer on Jan 21, 2018 17:51:27 GMT
There was a Disney series about an actual Mexican-American lawman named Elfego Baca.
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Post by deembastille on Jan 21, 2018 20:05:02 GMT
Well, Gabriel Iglesias would make fun of how his mother told him who his father was... she just showed him a bottle of hot sauce. as funny as it was, that is a little stereotype-honoring and encouraging.
and George Lopez [his sitcom] he is often seen as being closed minded and quick to jump to racist conclusions.
well, here's the thing about stereotypes... if you dislike the stereotype and resent it... you'd better not do it, not even behind closed doors.
as an Irishwoman, if i dislike the stereotype of the Irish wife being married to a drunk bum then my Irish husband {I'm single FYI} had better not come home drunk most nights. and if i dislike Irish women always thought to be barefoot and pregnant when i can't afford the brood of kids i have, then i'd better not be pregnant every year. simple as that. YOU make the change in the world.
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Post by deembastille on Jan 21, 2018 20:39:04 GMT
Well, as a child of a closet racist, i will say one thing... it is hard to drop the stereotypes you are taught or were surrounded with while growing up. I asked my mother relatively recently if she [who is 70] if she was afraid of black people when she was my age and or younger. she said yes and then she said she was brought up to be afraid of them. not being racist or denying them to their faces but just crossing the street when there would be a relatively large group of black men. [check this out: my mother is not the racist in my family]
I also have to say this about the 'orange baboon'... he is not against Mexicans as a whole, but the ones who are here undocumented. many of them who come here are not legal. there are some who are given special permission [they have these special license plates] to work here and then drive back to mexico at the end of the day. I am totally FOR anyone wanting a better life and wanting to participate in the adult society of their new home, but COME ON! nothing is for free in this world!
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Post by Primemovermithrax Pejorative on Jan 21, 2018 20:46:34 GMT
Interestingly Zorro is not a Mexican (not until perhaps the Banderas version). He was Spanish.
The thing with Treasure of the Sierra Madre is that they have Walter Huston joining the Indians. That is the multiculturalism message there. All the major studios had to have some diversity message. That particular message looks like he is the white savior but that is how the propaganda came across in those days. Or they made blacks comical characters.
In the remake of High Sierra starring Jack Palance they change the black character to a Mexican. Which reminds me--Jack Palance portrays a Mexican outlaw in the Professionals--that was not unsympathetic either (major studio).
The difference with the majors (those tied to communism) vs say US-founded RKO or Republic Pictures (thinking of the Adventures of Captain Marvel) is a that the latter had a "respect but separate" mantra. In King Kong the tribe of the island couldnt be trusted--but they weren't slandered for it--the message ultimately was that they should have left the island alone. The major studios on the other hand have a "western society is better without homogeneity."
In For a Few Dollars More the El Indio character is a child murdering Mexican rapist (although it seems to me there was a desire to make the character at least slightly sympathetic--that he was haunted by the suicide of the sister).
Then you see a change with the Good the Bad and the Ugly because the Mexican character Tuco is a little more sympathetic--and then in Once Upon A Time in the West I think it is suggested that both the Jason Robards and Charles Bronson characters are not white--but I dont remember that ever stated in the movie so it may be Liberal revisionism...but Leone did make a central character in Duck You Sucker a Mexican (and a rapist).
As Carl Denham says in King Kong, every legend has its basis in truth-and the same goes for stereotypes. That is just generalizations.
There are Mexican bandits and rapists. There may also be Mexican computer programmers but that doesn't change the fact that Mexican criminals exist. If you don't show them-or any racial stereotype ever, then you are denying Nature. Art is supposed to reflect truth.
A generalization is never monolithic and only stupid people take them that way.
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Post by manfromplanetx on Jan 21, 2018 20:56:42 GMT
Budd Boetticher love of sport and culture shines through in his excellent highly romantic Bullfighter and the Lady (1951). The 124 min print offers breathtaking bullfighting scenes far superior to anything seen before in Hollywood productions. The completely authentic scenes use at least ten pro Matadors, all were credited, sadly a Mexican stunt man was killed by a bull while filming one of these sequences. But more importantly the film naturally portrays Mexican people, an aspect rarely seen in American productions at this time, there is a genuine sense of cultural authenticity, giving us an insider's view of Mexico as it really was in 1950. Refreshingly there is absolutely no condescension here, brash American Johnny Regan (Stack) is the outsider who must adapt to new social customs of Mexican society, and Johnny needs to be taught to properly and politely observe family bonds to earn the respect of a local lady. Handsome Mexican Gilbert Roland played romantic Latin lovers for at least five decades, this was a welcome opportunity, a break from that typecast role, this may be his most honest & impressive performance., his father was a toreador . As Manolo Estrada, Roland oozes integrity and authority he's dedicated to his wife Chelo ( Katy Jurado) as well as his profession. This was the Hollywood debut for Katy Jurado Joy Page was the daughter of Mexican born José Paige (Don Alvarado) she plays Anita de la Vega
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Post by Doghouse6 on Jan 21, 2018 21:19:16 GMT
I also have to say this about the 'orange baboon'... he is not against Mexicans as a whole, but the ones who are here undocumented. Trump's prejudiced remarks have been directed at more than just Mexicans in the U.S. undocumented, some of the most notorious of which impugned the impartiality and integrity of U.S. District Judge Gonzalo Curiel after a ruling to which he objected, purely on the basis of the judge's heritage: "But we’re building a wall. He’s a Mexican. We’re building a wall between here and Mexico. This judge is giving us unfair rulings. Now I say why. Well, I want to — I’m building a wall, OK?"Some other of his remarks indicating disapproval more general than that of undocumenteds specifically: "Sadly, the overwhelming amount of violent crime in our major cities is committed by blacks and hispanics"
"When will the U.S. stop sending $'s to our enemies, i.e. Mexico and others."
"The Mexican legal system is corrupt, as is much of Mexico."
"Mexico's court system corrupt.I want nothing to do with Mexico other than to build an impenetrable WALL and stop them from ripping off U.S."
They could be parsed to infer prejudice "not against Mexicans as a whole," but clearly encompass more than simply undocumenteds.
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