The Border, Performed in Films: Produced in both Mexico and the US to “Bring Out the Worst in a Country”

Abstract

Border scholars have long understood borders as social constructions around territories and identities. Drawing on interdisciplinary perspectives, my objective is to analyze the cultural production and “othering” processes of the multiple US–Mexico borderlands via good-quality films emanating from both Mexico City and the US, particularly Hollywood, in two periods: historical background on the 1930s–1980s and the contemporary period of the last two decades. I compare differences across multiple border sites along the near 2,000 mile line—west coast Pacific, central El Paso-Ciudad Juárez, and east coast Gulf of Mexico—as well as those sites inbetween. My overarching argument is that the film industry itself brings out the worst of countries in the US–Mexico borderlands. By “worst,” I mean lawlessness, sexual violence, deaths, and drugs, with “othering” processes alive and well on both sides of the border. As such, in both historical and contemporary films, everyday lives in the borderlands are not well represented.

Acknowledgments

Many thanks to the reviewers, Irasema Coronado, and Guadalupe Correa-Cabrera for reading the manuscript.

Notes

¹ The United States usurped the term “American” for its citizens, despite the fact that the Western Hemisphere contains Americans from North, Central, and South America. I use this version, despite such usurpation.

² Drawing on the 1983 Paz Agreement, the borderlands exist 100 kilometers north and south of the borderline.

³ There are different ways to determine income inequalities, such as per capita income, a measure of central tendency, but one affected by the valuation or overvaluation of the peso to the dollar (See Staudt 1998, Ch 3). I prefer to contrast legal minimum wages. The legal minimum in the US is $7.25 per hour or $58 per day, while the Mexican legal minimum, a slight premium for the northern border, hovers at 50 pesos per day, or approximately $4, depending on the peso-dollar exchange rate which changes constantly. Thus, an approximate 10:1 ratio exists.

⁴ Thanks to Tony Payan for pointing out the strangeness in these films, tapped by and shown in French film schools as emblematic surrealism.

⁵ I have watched this film many times, and thank Netflix for making the latest edited version of the 1990s edition available. Welles was so unhappy with the 1958 edited version that he wrote a lengthy memo on desired changes, left Hollywood, and vowed never to do another film there.

⁶ See note 3.

⁷ On a four-star scale (****), typical of cable TV movies and media reviews, criteria for which I have absorbed, given many viewings over the years, most of these films would be rated three stars or better except, perhaps, for The Border and Savages, despite high-profile stars and directors, respectively. My criteria include quality and enduring value of the script, images, and dramatic performances. Reviewers' scales are ultimately subjective, unless based on (selective) users' comments, such as the online ratings for film websites, like the ten-point scales of the Internet Movie Data base (IMDb.com) and Rotten Tomatoes (rottentomatoes.com) showing images for a fresh or rotten tomato for each published critic and the average score of viewers plus the percent who “liked” the film. Of course, one must note the total number of viewers, some of which display intensity biases. Like political meetings, users can “pack” and sway the ultimate (rating) outcomes.