(Luis Valdez, US 1981, 103 min., DCP)
Luis Valdez adapts his own stage production (the first Latin-American play on Broadway) into this striking film version. Edward James Olmos reprises his role from the stage as “El Pachuco,” the narrator of the film and the conscience of Henry Reyna (Daniel Valdez, also reprising his role). Alternating between past and present and stage and screen, the film tells the story of Henry, arrested for murder the day before he is to report for duty in World War II. Browbeaten by the police, Henry’s case is forced through the system while El Pachuco shows the events leading up to the fatal confrontation. Inspired by the 1942 Sleepy Lagoon murder trial and the 1943 Zoot Suit riots, Valdez’s work explores the lives of Mexican-Americans in a society that would just as soon discard them.
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Latin Cinematic Heritage The cinema of Fellini is marked by a passion for life often revealed in the glowing face of the director’s wife, Giulietta Masina, who stars here in one of his finest films. Masina is Gelsomina, a pantomime artist in the spirit of Chaplin, who, being sold to strongman Zampanò (Anthony Quinn), serves as his dutiful assistant and eventually develops a genuine affection for the brute.