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Overlooked & Underrated Docs & Features
(click on broll or dschwartz for all his posts)
The Latin Explosion: A New America Narrated by John Leguizamo, “The Latin Explosion” is a celebration of Latino culture’s emergence in the United States, with a focus on the culture’s impact on the nation’s pop music and film. The documentary leads us through a musical-historical outline of icons from Desiderio Alberto Arnaz y de Acha, III—also known as Desi Arnaz—to Romero Santos and Pitbull.
Directors-producers Jon Alpert and Matthew O'Neill fly viewers through a dizzying journey of obscure names and performances from 1940s through the second decade of the 21st century. The journey is threaded with critical information from concurrent socio-political history. “Next step is the White House,” Pittbull succinctly proclaims at film’s conclusion. I will be surprised if Julian Castro is not on the shortlist of possible Democratic nominees for Vice President.
The film bursts with an astounding amount of information, music, and images in its too-short 65 minutes. But, then again, it is an HBO show, and the cable channel sets standards for quality and power in documentary filmmaking.
Once in a blue moon a film’s editing strikes deep. It’s that time again. “The Latin Explosion” is masterfully edited by David Meneses and Gladys Murphy