Border Brujo

Sitting at an altar decorated with a kitsch collection of cultural fetish items, and wearing a border patrolman’s jacket decorated with buttons, bananas, beads, and shells, Gómez-Peña delivers a sly and bitter indictment of U.S. colonial attitudes toward Mexican culture and history. Whirling through various Mexican American stereotypes, pulling on costumes as easily as accents, Gómez-Peña emphasizes the collision of Mexican and American cultures, their mixture and misunderstanding of each other, each appearing as a dream/nightmare reflection of the “Other.” In turns powerful and playful, Border Brujo poignantly illustrates the double edge of forced cultural occupation.

Director: Isaac Artenstein

This title is also available on Border Art Clásicos (1990-2005): An Anthology of Collaborative Video Works by Guillermo Gómez-Peña.