(PNS reporting from MALIBU) Pot-banging hippies gathered on Southern California beaches yesterday and chased away the space dragon that was swallowing our Sun.

“We totally knew this humongous dragon was comin’ brah, so we set up a Facebook page and got everyone down here with their bongos and pots and pans. Our sonic countermeasures commenced mere seconds after the sun-gobbling began,” a pot-banger named Dank Donald told PNS.

National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) officials confirmed the monster space dragon’s departure.

“Once those hippies set their bongos on stun, that bugger took off like it was trying to make the Kessel Run in under 12 parsecs,” NASA spokesman and retired astronaut Jose Jimenez said, “and we’re thankful for their help. If you thought there was trouble with tribbles, giant sun-eating space dragons are way worse.”

“Yesterday I was anxious, but I’m gonna wang chung tonight!”

This article first appeared in Pocho.com.

Pocho Ñews Service PNS is a wholly-fictitious subsidiary of Pochismo, Inc., a California corporation, who is a person according to the Supreme Court. Don’t ask us, we just work here. 

[Photo by  NASA Goddard]

Don’t know what Rasquache means? Neither did I until I discoveredReel Rasquache Art & Film Festival, and realized how perfect the selection of Smuggled as the festival’s closing night film was for the festival. Rasquache art is described as using the most basic and simplest means necessary to create the desired expression, in essence, creating the most from the least. The term, originally, had a negative connotation in Mexico regarding being impoverished or lower class, but the Chicano arts movement transformed the term, and it has come to reference art that makes the most out of the least.

Smuggled, the latest film from Think Ten Media Group and Latino-American director Ramon Hamilton, tells the story of 9-year-old Miguel Rodriguez and his mother, Hilaria Rodriguz, as the pair are smuggled into the U.S. in a small, hidden compartment of a tourist bus. Most of the film takes place in the tiny compartment. Hamilton and a small crew took a limited budget and made a very powerful and moving film, which has its LA Premiere at Reel Rasquache Art & Film Festival on May 20th at 6 p.m. at the Casa 0101 Theater in East L.A.

Hamilton himself wrote, shot, directed and edited the feature-length film, which is primarily Spanish-language and which received the Founders’ Award at its first festival, the Riverside International Film Festival last month.

“Being accepted into the Reel Rasquache Art & Film Festival means a lot to me because our film really does embody the Rasquache spirit. We had a limited budget, but knew we could tell an important story, which is always my goal as a filmmaker. I’m always trying to tell dynamic stories. Sometimes those stories are drawn from real life, which is the case with Smuggled,” explains Hamilton.

Other key cast and crew for the film include: Denisse Bon (Lead Actress), Ramsess Letrado (Lead Actor), Garrett Marchbank (Supporting Actor) and Cisco Marchbank (Supporting Actor) with key songs provided by Jxel Rajchenberg, Owen Plant and Andrew Vladeck.

In addition to screening in L.A. this coming weekend, Smuggled also screens at the 9th Annual Tupelo Film Festival (in Tupelo, MS) on Friday, May 18th at 4:30 p.m.

This article first appeared in Latino LA.

[Photo screenshot reelrasquache.org]

Movies based off toys aren’t really my forte. While I did enjoy the firstTransformers movie to an extent, it wasn’t enough to warrant any other subsequent viewings. After three Transformers movies, we now haveBattleship, based off the popular kids’ game. I’ve played Battleship a few times, and I can’t say it’s one of my favorite games. Therefore, it comes as no surprise that I went to see this movie with very low expectations. That proved to work out well for me, since I found Battleship to actually be somewhat entertaining.

So how did they turn Battleship the Game into a movie? Well, it starts off with a pretty funny sequence to show off how much of a screw-up Alex Hopper (Taylor Kitsch) is. His brother, Stone (Alexander Skarsgård), is a Naval commander and forces Alex to join the Navy, so he can straighten out. Then follows another sequence in which we discover that despite being in the Navy, Alex still has some discipline issues. It takes a long time for this movie to get started. It had way too much set-up, especially for a story that is as simple as this. We get that Alex is cocky, arrogant and uncontrollable; we didn’t need several different scenes explaining this to us. (Yet, we got them anyway.) Liam Neeson plays Admiral Shane; he’s the head honcho around there and probably the only guy who can really intimidate Alex. Unfortunately for him, Alex is in love with Shane’s daughter, Sam (Brooklyn Decker).  After messing up royally, he goes on one last Navy exercise with a fleet of ships which ends up turning into a battle against aliens who are threating to take over the world.

The one and only thing that Battleship has going for it is its cheesiness. I did not expect it to be funny, and while I did laugh at the moments that were supposed to be comedic, there were several unintentionally funny scenes as well. The dialogue is so bad, but the corniness still managed to entertain me. The acting that went along with the dialogue was laughable as well. Not to say that they’re bad actors, but with material like that, it’s difficult to show off any real talent. (And for the record, I truly think Rihanna’s talents only lie in the music industry.)

I’m not the best judge of visual effects, but the effects in Battleship were good, probably not the best though. (After seeing Avengers, it’s hard to top large-scale CGI like that.) I was hoping that maybe we’d get some pretty cool aliens. We didn’t. The aliens and how they worked were lame and just made the plot more eye-roll worthy. The only thrilling part of the movie was when it started to be like the actual game it’s based off, and from that point on, the story picks up and finally starts moving.

Battleship isn’t a good movie, but it isn’t the worst movie ever. If you love Transformers, I would suggest seeking it out, but I still wouldn’t go out of my way. In fact, I would really suggest just waiting to rent this movie or not seeing it at all. Yes, I did find it sort of entertaining, but I did see it for free. I would probably be much harsher if I doled out $10 to see this forgettable flick.

Battleship hits theaters this Friday, May 18^th in the US.

The Young Folks is a website dedicated to give everyone a young perspective of what’s new in today’s pop culture. We will talk about the latest albums, movies, TV shows, concerts, and books that everyone is talking about, etc.

If I were a visitor from another planet (I ask friends and family to hold their sarcasm) and I were trying to understand U. S. Latinos by their online output, I’d probably come away with two conclusions: they’re very social, and they spend a lot of time discussing their identity. Or, seen in a positive light: they don’t seem to have a grasp of who they are, but they find each other easily.

I’m not saying that’s the reality, just that that’s the impression a non-Latino visitor might get, because that’s how we tend to behave. We’re always going on about what it means to be Latino in the U.S., and in the same breath admit that there’s no conclusive answer. And then we go at it again as if it were a new question. All the while talking up a storm, connecting and chatting and sharing and linking and stuff. Why do we do that? (I know…why am I doing it now? asking questions about asking the question.)

I think some of the blame has to fall on the tool, on the internet itself. Not that the intent of the internet developers was to eventually drive U.S. Latinos batty with introspection. No, but the web has given us all an amplified voice and we all know what happens when you hand out megaphones in a room full of Latinos… (This would be the perfect place in the body of a post to insert official statistics about Latino online behavior or Census data, but I’m not partial to overkill, so I won’t; we all know those numbers.)

See, we can talk this way about each other; we can air our own idiosyncrasies among ourselves – which is what we’re doing every day on the Internets.  The problem is that the folks listening-in on our conversation, trying to get a handle on our nuance, haven’t a clue about what we’re saying. When that happens they choose a spokes person, or two, who they trust will speak for the rest of us. And so you end up with the “experts” on all things Latino – politics, lifestyle, market, advertising, etc… – whose faces and by lines we see and read repeatedly. Same faces, same bylines, same ideas, same ole-same ole. And in order to remain relevant those same-ole Latino spokespersons need to adapt to their audience. So they become either tired, trite or gimmicky.

Meanwhile the Latino conversation is vigorous, constant and lively.

So, here’s my dos pesos worth of an idea: we don’t need experts or translators; what’re needed are observers and tour guides. If I were a visitor from another planet I’d need someone who could give me a tour of the vast and varied U.S. Latino culture, and not short-change me with a simple explanation. And I’d like for the guide to be honest and tell me that all he/she could offer is, at best, their own limited observation. How refreshing, no?

I don’t speak for the entire Latino culture, but, hear the sound on the internet? That’s the sound of lively Latino navel gazing – keep your hands and feet inside the car at all times.

[Photo by Campanero Rumbero]

From the textmex obsessed imagination of 

I am just processing the news that one of my dearest mentors, the great Mexican author and public intellectual Carlos Fuentes, has passed away–the latest links will be appearing here.

Here’s a recent BBC Mundo piece and streaming interview with Fuentes from December 2011–the streaming video appears below the imagelink.

This post first appeared in the textmex galleryblog.

William Anthony Nericcio, aka “Memo,” is the Director of San Diego State University’s ever-evolving MALAS program(The Master of Arts in Liberal Arts and Sciences)–a dynamic, interdisciplinary, cultural studies graduate program located near the U.S./Mexico border. Nericcio also serves on the faculties of theChicana/o Studies Department, theCenter for Latin American Studiesand the Department of English and Comparative Literature at SDSU.

I’ve realized that the 80s were not kind to Latina women. Growing up I did not have many icons to look up to.  However, just because they weren’t there, doesn’t mean they didn’t exist.  It wasn’t until later on that I realized that there were plenty of Latinas in Hollywood, they were just hidden.  Latina women have been gracing the silver screen since the silent era of film. These women not only captivated audiences but made an everlasting impression in an industry that once excluded minorities.

Leading the pack was Myrtle Gonzales, an American silent film actress who was regarded as Hollywood’s first Latina and Hispanic movie star actress in 1911. Dolores Del Rio, a Mexican film actress, roared through the 20’s with beauty, class, and identity intact. She was dubbed as the first Mexican to succeed in Hollywood, and her career influenced other Latinas such as Rita Hayworth, Jennifer Lopez and even inspiring actress Joan Crawford.  During the silver-age of film Rita Hayworth, (born Margarita Carmen Cansino) captivated audiences with her beauty and sexual charisma.  As both a legendary actress and pin-up, Rita became the epitome of Latin America Beauty during the 1940’s. Rita Moreno, another icon best known for her role in “West Side Story”.  Afterwards, she broke ethnic and cultural barriers by breaking free from stereotypical roles, becoming one of the first Latina performers to win an Oscar, Emmy, a Tony, and Grammy.

These icons not only captivated audiences with their beauty and poise, but broke down barriers for Latinas in popular culture for decades after.  Their beauty both on and off the screen paved the Hollywood walk of fame for future wonder women, such as half-Mexican 70’s icon Linda Carter; MTV’s first Latina VJ of the 80’s Daisy Fuentes; and 90’s icons Rosie Perez, Eva Mendes, Penelope Cruz, and  Jennifer Lopez.  Nowadays, the Latina presence is so prominent in popular culture that it is hard not to feel the influence.  Latina icons are not only perfecting their talents on screen, but off of it as well. From Salma Hayek’s production company “Ventanazul”, to Eva Longoria’s new role as a producer on ABC’s upcoming show “Devious Maids”, Latina women are taking on roles that we could not have imagined filling just 20 years ago; roles that are not just limited to film, but those that involve the entertainment industry as a whole.

Latina women have given the term icon a whole new meaning. They have not only brought their beauty into popular culture but have brought their values, passions, and work ethic with them. From icons to entrepreneurs, we have started a trend that does not seem to be slowing down anytime soon.  Sofia Vergara is a testament that our strong nature, desire to succeed, and love for our heritage is able to cross over into the hearts and homes of the Modern Family.

With the next generation of powerful Latina ladies such as Selena Gomez, Demi Lovato, and Victoria Justice on the rise,  we can watch these strong icons influencing a whole new type of viewer, like my daughter.  We now have something to look forward to, something that my generation did not have- a strong Latina role model.

Hailing from Chicago, IL, Natalia is a freelance journalist who has worked for NBC and numbers of online publications. After receiving her degree in Communications from Columbia University, Natalia’s passion for writing would follow her into the community, its culture, and the arts. During her free time, Natalia plans on publishing her first graphic novel which is poetry based later this year. Follow her on twitter @Colomitalia.

This article first appeared in Our Tiempo.

I’m interested in Carlos Fuentes’ political side.

There is a fine line, somewhere, that signals the place where you’ve gone too far. I don’t want to cross that line talking about Carlos Fuentes.  The fact that he passed away this week was a great loss for the world of literature and letters in general – even more so for the Latin American world of letters and politics. I’ll say this: he was a great influence in my life, although I never met him, aside from a brief lecture at a local university. But I do know several people who knew him and they speak of him glowingly.

But, like I said, I’m interested in his political side.  Specifically I’m interested in what he had to say about Mexican migration to the U.S. It’s a topic that has good people looking suspiciously at each other, gnarling when they should be building a common good. The good thing is that he left us plenty of fodder t0 discuss. And for that I’ll lean on a recent post written by Leslie Bernstein Rojas, curator at SCPR’s Multi-American blog. She writes:

What he said then resonates now, as migration from Mexico has dwindled in recent years, while some states have passed strict anti-illegal immigration laws that have left farmers in short supply of immigrant workers.

“In Mexico, we have a duty as well, and it is to provide labor to these workers. I wish they had never left Mexico. In the future, I want them to stay in Mexico. Mexico is a deeply divided country — 50 percent of the population of 100 million is poor. There should be jobs waiting for them. There are not. They have to come to the United States. We should provide jobs for 50 million Mexicans and help us step out of poverty. We’re still mired in poverty in Mexico. So I wish we had the offer of these jobs.

If we had a Franklin Roosevelt, he would find a way to give jobs to the 50 million, who would not migrate. But then that would be your problem: Where are your workers coming from?”

It’s a very healthy attitude, to look at the immigration issue as more than an argument about a line on a map and who has permission to cross it. Fuentes framed immigration around the human problems of sustenance, work, corruption, folly and need. Always leading to more: questions, discussions, and considerations.

You can read Bernstein’s complete post HERE.

[Photo by MDCarchives]

I am reminded that Mother’s Day (the real one) was celebrated on Thursday the 10^th. This holiday was a particularly hard one to celebrate in our household. My mother was the kind of woman that would not want you to make a fuss over her but at the same time would be the first to criticize any lack of effort. She was content with the same gift every year. All she wanted was a nice meal with the family and an envelope filled with money. My mother always hated gift certificates. First, she would disregard them because they were not cash, but secondly and most importantly she would become angered because she considered gift certificates to be inconsiderate suggestions as to where she should be spending her money.

Mother’s Day was the day where we all put our political ideologies aside and celebrated the woman who had given so much of herself. Even my dad would abstain from drinking on Saturday, so that he could be as fresh as a daisy and tolerate my sister and me. We all knew that we had to go to church and endure 50 minutes of being told we were going to hell, 6 minutes of salvation, and 4 minutes of community events. We were also reminded that if we gave a little bit more to the collection plate, the church would be able to provide air conditioning rather than rely on those heavy fans that looked like they came off a set from a silent movie.

After church, we all shuffled from one frying pan and into another frying pan: my father’s Crown Victoria, with the kind of windows that would roll down with little or no guarantee they would roll back up. My mother considered Hometown Buffet to be a nice meal, even though the rest of us would protest and hope she would reconsider. She had always enjoyed buffets because they offered so many choices, none of us could possibly complain about a meal the buffet didn’t have. If we wanted burgers, Hometown Buffet had them. If we wanted pizza, Hometown Buffet had them. I’m sure if had an appetite for baby seal served in a white elephant’s trunk, Hometown Buffet would have found a way to serve it.

 The problem with Hometown Buffet was not the menu selection but rather the timing. It seemed that my mother was not alone in her love for buffets. Mothers would guilt their unwilling families to stand in line for upwards of two hours in order to enter. The four of us would stand there waiting for what seemed to be eons because it always seemed that the Buffet only had tables for sets of three or five. I could feel myself aging in line. All the while, my mother talked about the kind of salad she was going to get.

When we eventually sat down, we were warned that we had to eat: there would be consequences if we came back with a tray filled with cheesecake. The first unwritten rule was that you had to have at least two servings before you were allowed to get a dessert. The second one was that you had to have something green on your plate that was not Jell-o. The mariachi would play in the background and my mother would stuff my pockets and her purse with sugar cookies and chicken drumsticks wrapped in about a million napkins – claiming that it was for the alley cats that kept my dad company while he read the morning paper.

 Those are the days I wish I could still have. We do not go to Hometown Buffet as much anymore since my parents passed on. Whenever we do go, it is usually on a whim. The weird thing is, the unspoken rules are still observed. My sister and I still make two rounds before attacking the dessert stand. We sit around telling the same stories, whether it is about my mom’s non-tipping policy or my dad making us claim we were five years younger than we actually were so that we could save 50 cents a head; they’re all memories that make mother’s day worth remembering.

[Photo by  Rusty Clark]

Expect the unexpected in an ambush of the senses not recommended for the weak stomach, this absurd comedy is a visual and verbal onslaught of obscenities from the creator of ‘Borat’ and ‘Bruno’.

A brave opening dedication may cause a few nervous laughs from the outset, but that’s nothing to prepare you for the lunacy that follows. The nonsensical storyline shows the rise of tyrant and supreme leader General Aladeen of the fictional middle eastern republic of Wadiyan. Rich beyond belief from natural sources, he has a serious misconduct of style and no idea how to treat others with respect. Surrounded by beautiful female guards, he is a revolutionary without a clue, except barking ridiculous demands to his disposable operatives. Through some conspiracy, Aladeen heads to America where he is not well received. After a fake assassination from his own people who replace him with a dim-witted goat herding body double, the real Aladeen has to survive in the real world on the streets of New York. Befriending a tomboy feminist vegan anti political organic grocery store owner, the scene is set for some eccentric activity.

Pushing the envelope of decency, this one of a kind film goes out of its way to offend everyone with a pulse and even someone who hasn’t in a funeral scene not soon forgotten. Audiences will be divided with actor Sacha Baron Cohen as either a comic genius or simply an audacious lark marching to the beat of his own drum. However, like him or not, the abrasive enthusiasm he brings to his character is infectious even if the humour is hit and miss. No doubting his talent, chameleon Baron Cohen was delightful in the recent ‘Hugo’ proving to be actually likeable in a relatively normal role.

Full of set pieces that are more demented than the last including exploring the madness of childbirth in public and a riotous helicopter ride above the Manhattan skyscrapers. Watch for some uncredited cameo appearances from courageous Hollywood stars Megan Fox and Edward Norton, while veteran Oscar winner Ben Kingsley is at his deadpan best. Anatomy references and crude behaviour is at a premium, no race, religion, age or stereotype is safe from ridicule, you have been warned.

The Young  Folks: We are a website in which we review music, movies, books, concerts. For young people by young people.

General Douglas MacArthur said in his farewell speech in 1951 that old soldiers never die; they just fade away. It is the same with writers and artists, they never die, and they do not even fade away. They stay with us and leave the legacy of their thoughts on the printed page.

We can recreate their prose, their style, their ideas for as long as we live, reaching out to newer and younger generations. They are called classics. And all those who stay behind become the inheritors of their production. Each time we open a book by Carlos Fuentes, for example, we recreate his ideas, we commune with a writer who is no longer alive in the flesh, but whose thought will endure as long as humanity endures.

He taught at Harvard, Princeton, Brown, Pennsylvania, Columbia and Cambridge.

What else? At the age of thirty he published his first novel La región más transparente, which became a classic, where the Spanish, the indigenous and the mestizo mix, depicting life in the City of Mexico and the culture of the country in general.

His 1984 novel, Gringo viejo, was filmed as Old Gringo, with Gregory Peck and Jane Fonda. The book hit the US best-seller list.

Premio Rómulo Gallegos, Cervantes Prize, Príncipe de Asturias Award, Gran Cruz de la Orden de Isabel la Católica and since 2001 a member of the Academia Mexicana de la Lengua. All except the Nobel Prize, but we all know that award is like the lottery, if not more whimsical.

He is one of the best-known Spanish-language writers in the world today, and rightly so. That is why I said at the onset that writers of his stature do not die or fade away: they stay with us, giving us what we sometimes call culture, which he tried to capture in his fiction and essays. In his case he was able to mesmerize the American English-speaking readership, a difficult market whose attention to hold.

He was a sharp critic of Mexico and the US, who never minced words, and was very outspoken. He was once denied entry into the US, but many other writers have had that honor bestowed upon them also.

He carried a life-long love affair with language and words. Being one of Mexico’s greatest living authors, we have a good excuse now to take up one of his novels:

La muerte de Artemio Cruz, by Carlos Fuentes

La voluntad y la fortuna (Destiny and Desire)

La frontera de cristal (The Crystal Frontier)

Cristóbal Nonato (Christopher Unborn)

La muerte de Artemio Cruz (The Death of Artemio Cruz)

Gringo viejo (Old Gringo)

“Los sajones nunca dicen lugares comunes. –Por eso me gustan los latinos.” (Anglos never use trite expressions. That is why I like Latinos. Carlos Fuentes, Cantar de ciegos, 1964.

Read his novels and let him talk to you. And listen hard.

You may follow D.C. Basset on Twitter

This article first appeared in Voxxi.

[Photo by MDCarchives]