Reviews - Trinity University

Huaco-Nuzum
tracts from the power of the message, character representation,
and visual aesthetic.
Narrative closure in Mi Familia mimics the ending of the
Hollywood western in which the hero rides off into the sunset,
only this time the hero Jimmy rides off with his son
Carlitos to an indeterminate future of single parenthood. Feminist
film theory has pointed out how popular cinema assigns
gender difference to narrative closure. The hero is given a certain
freedom of action to accept social integration through
marriage or to remain alone as an act of resistance. For the
female character, however, the only choice for social integration
continues to be marriage. Jimmy and Carlitos represent
the promise of the new generation upon whom the culture
rests, promising to perpetuate the theme of remembrance,
cultural identity, and, unfortunately, the validation of patriarchy.
Jimmy is portrayed as a victim of social and economic
injustices that, under the present social system of stratification
(race, class and gender), cannot be resolved. As Paco reminds
the audience,
Jimmy represents the family, the sacrificial lamb
who contains within his being all the pain, hate,
suffering, racial persecution, and impotence of the
family.
Again, the Chicana, Latina is subsumed by the patriarchal
voice that discounts her subjectivity, desire, and agency and
calls out hasta cuando corazon, must you remain el gallo macho
of Mi Familia.
Carmen Huaco-Nuzum
Notes
This review was excerpted from a longer article in progress, “Gender
and Sexual Representation in Mi Farnilia/My Family (Orale patriarchy:
hasta cuando corazon will you remain el gallo macho of mi
familia) .”
1. Homi K. Bhabha, “Anxious Nations, Nervous States,” Supposing
the Subject, ed. Joan Copjec (New York: Verso, 1994), 202.
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