'Hollywood distorts Mexico's image'

Washington, Sep 15 (IANS/EFE) Hollywood presents a distorted image of Mexico, according to Mexico's Ambassador to the US Eduardo Medina Mora.

Stereotypes of "gardeners and drug traffickers" fail to mention contributions Mexicans have made to the US, he added.

"Mexicans on the silver screen are usually portrayed as poor and uneducated at best, corrupt and violent at worst," Mora said at a press conference at the National Press Club in Washington Friday.

"I'm still eagerly waiting for the movie where Salma Hayek plays a Nobel Prize-winning chemist that teaches young Americans to create new forms of alternative energy," he said.

Mora said not even Demian Bichir, nominated for an Oscar, escaped the trap of stereotypes, having played a gardener and a drug trafficker in the movies "A Better Life" and "Savages" respectively.

The diplomat stressed the importance of ridding American movies of the myths that persist about Mexican immigrants, because "the American public, which consumes those types of movies, will inevitably be influenced by them".

Drug trafficking was a problem that affects Mexico and other parts of the world, and portraying Mexicans as drug dealers and corrupt policemen "is not only racist, it is totally wrong", he said.

-- IANS/EFE

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