September 28, 2007
By Kaylah Baca
PR/LACC was host to an intriguing documentary on Latina women and how society portrays them on Thursday night. Louis P. Moreno is the president of Skyline Features, an English and Spanish-language multimedia production and educational company. He has directed over 70 documentaries and it was his recently-created short film, entitled "Latina Confessions," that was shown to the gathered audience at PR/LACC. When asked by a student what audience he intended "Latina Confessions" for, he smiled and said, "You," which was further explained to mean young, college women who were of more than one race or culture.
Moreno himself is of Cuban-Argentine background and was born in the South Bronx. He grew up in a Puerto Rican community and is fluent in Spanish and English. He is a member of many prestigious associations for Latino film directors and has had 9 documentaries air on HBO. Moreno has given many speeches at colleges, high schools and middle schools across the nation, and is also a self-proclaimed feminist.
The first thing Moreno said to the audience was, "I love documentaries. I mean, real life is so absurd, who needs to make it up?"
Right away, one could tell he was witty, informative and very passionate about his movie and the issues it brought up.
The documentary, "Latina Confessions," contained the interviews of 25 women who were considered Latina. They gave their personal confessions and answered the big question: What does it mean to be Latina growing up in the United States? The film, which ran 55 minutes long, is still considered a work in progress. Many more Latinas across the U.S. still need to be interviewed to get a better view of Latina groups in different cities. Some of the women interviewed were born in the United States while others came to this country as children.
The documentary opened up with shots of women laughing, smiling and saying things like, "As a Latina woman, you never quite fit in with just one culture," or, "I'm fluent in Spanglish, but I can't speak Spanish" and "Latinas come in every shape or form and you can't label that."
The first part of the film was about family history. All of the women said they were proud to be Latina. They were grateful that their parents came to this country to give them a better life.
Living in the United States gave them the best of both worlds they said, because they had the traditions of their parents culture, yet they had the opportunities available to them here in this country. One woman even said that a big decision she had to make was if she would go back to the country she was born in, because it would definitely not be the same because culturally, economically, socially and emotionally, things for her are too contrasting between her two countries.
The Latinas interviewed were college-educated women who were goal-oriented. This caused problems with their families who were so rooted in their traditions, whether they were of Mexican, Puerto Rican or Cuban heritage. The women's parents didn't want them to leave the house because they almost saw it as a negative thing, but these women had their own mind-sets. One elderly lady told the camera that she ran away from home because her parents were driving her crazy with expectations on how she should be as a Latina woman.
The women went on to say that they were often in an internal struggle to fit in with a culture or race because they were of more than one ethnicity. Often they found it hard to fit in as "Americans" because their skin wasn't white enough yet when they attempted to assimilate with their fellow Mexican or Puerto Rican sisters, they were not Mexican or Puerto Rican enough.
One Latina woman said that, "everyone tried to put us in the American melting pot, but we needed to be seen as individuals."
When the question of how Latina sexuality is impacted by traditions and the stereotypical portrayals of Latina women, one interviewee said that "navigating sexuality in itself is a challenge in many ways." Another Latina woman said about love and sex that, "It's about choosing a partner who can embrace the personality that you present to them."
On one side their family, especially the women of the family, are telling them that they have to remain virgins until they get married. Being "pure" is was a major deal within their culture, more often than not because the mothers and aunts were Catholics. However, everyone expects Latinas to be sexy and flirty yet innocent at the same time. They would be seen as "cute" by the Latino men and, unfortunately, as meat. One woman said this was because, "Latino men have yet to accept that times have changed and women are not going to fit into the stereotypical Latina woman like they once did."
Moreno said himself later, that in order for the young Latinas to change this stereotype of a Latina woman and what the public thinks she should look like or act, they should just start by "telling your story."
By the time the film finished, the audience was laughing and many students were anxious to tell Moreno how his documentary impacted them personally. Many students did share their feelings of relating to the women in the documentary and they all sounded relieved and excited to be able to.
Moreno told the crowd that he paid $50,000 out of his own pocket just because he wanted to make this documentary about Latina women who he respects. He loves the subject of culture and finding out how others just like him are straddling more than one. For him personally, he said that it took him 20 years to get to the point where he is confident in saying he is Cuban-Argentine, but it has been a life struggle to get here.
He said to the audience, "At the end of the day, what is most important is who you say you are."
Source: The Daily Campus
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