Mel Gibson goes to Mexico

So tonight I went to see Borat (which I will probably make a whole separate post about) and I saw an interesting preview before the feature presentation. The trailer was for Mel Gibson’s new movie “Apocalypto,” which comes out in December. After being confused by the trailer I went online when I got home to see what the movie was all about. So basically, it’s about the decline of the Maya civilization. The trailer starts with a quote that’s something like “A civilization can’t destroyed from without until it’s weakened from within”. I thought that was a little odd, and seemed to be downplaying the effects of colonialism.

Other notable things about the film are that all the dialogue is all in an indigenous language and the entire cast is Mexican and/or indigenous. I read an article about Gibson and how he was being awarded by the Latin Business Association for his “vision and courage” in making this movie. Gibson says "It is generally a conceit of filmmakers that history only began with Europeans." It’s great that he’s using a native language and not casting white people in brownface. But Gibson forgets that it’s also generally a conceit of filmmakers that indigenous people in the Americas died out, or that the only stories worth telling about them are those set in a distant, mythologized past. From what I’ve seen so far, I don’t think “Apocalypto” is any exception to that. It’s so rare to see representations of contemporary indigenous people, and I question why mainstream Hollywood films tend to cling to the past in this way.

The Latin Business Association also commented that they think the movie will challenge the growing anti-Latino rhetoric in the U.S. It’s true that there is an anti-Latino sentiment around that stems largely from heated discussions on immigration. But what does it mean to make a film that associates the ancestors of Latino people with the fall of a civilization?

I don’t know. Maybe I just find everything Mel Gibson does to be suspect because I deeply dislike him. I’ll leave you with a Mel quote:

"Apocalypto," he said "is not really a Hollywood production. It is a film made by Mexico."

And here’s the trailer:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uD77YsJCuGU

I wanted to post a link to the article but the link is too long and it stretches out my entire post to an annoying length. It should be pretty easy to find on google though.