Latino Pop Culture: Sex, Drugs, and Banda Music in Mexico’s B-Filmography

Rashotte, Ryan

This book provides the first comprehensive study of narco cinema, a cross-border exploitation cinema that, for over forty years, has been instrumental in shaping narco-culture in Mexico and the US borderlands. Identifying classics in its mammoth catalogue and analyzing select films at length, Rashotte outlines the genre's history and aesthetic criteria. He approaches its history as an alternative to mainstream representation of the drug war and considers how its vernacular aesthetic speaks to the anxieties and desires of Latina/o audiences by celebrating regional cultures while exploring the dynamics of global transition. Despite recent federal prohibitions, narco cinema endures as a popular folk art because it reflects distinctively the experiences of those uprooted by the forces of globalization and critiques those forces in ways mainstream cinema has failed.

Details

Published by: Palgrave Macmillan

Publication Date: 2015-11-08

Format: Paperback

ISBN-13: 9781349505517

DOI: 10.1057/9781137489241

Dimensions: 216cm x140cm

Pages: 196