American Latino Film

Just as American Latino literature is quickly gaining on the stuff written in Latin America, the films by American Latinos—sometimes in English, sometimes in Spanish—are slowly coming to define the film-making of Spanish America. In reality, American Latino film stars Anthony Queen (Antonio Rodolfo Quinn Oaxaca), Rita Hayworth (Margarita Carmen Cansino) and Rachel Welsh (Jo Raquel Tejada), to name just a few, have been an integral part of Hollywood from the very beginning, while not many people remember that great Puerto Rican actor Jose Ferrer won an Oscar for best actor in the 1950 movie Cyrano de Bergerac. A more self-concious Latino film movement has been growing fast and in very different places, and directors like Luis Valdez and actors and actresses from John Leguizamo to Jennifer Lopez are making and acting in movies with a singular feel.