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August 7, 2009 | Comments (70)
As part of this week’s unofficial look at lazy and offensive racial stereotypes (see also Sassiest Black Female Characters) today we are going to tackle another stereotype: The menacing-looking Hispanic dude. Far more than African-Americans these days, Hispanics are widely caricatured as maids, gardeners, lazy do-nothings, or — in the case of many Hispanic women — big-bootied seductresses who fall in love with white women. Also, all Hispanics (and Latinos) are either from Mexico or Puerto Rica, no exceptions.
The most common Hispanic stereotype, however, is the menacing thug, the scary-looking motherfucker who will kill you and steal your white girlfriend. It’s an unfortunate stereotype, but there are several actors (Hispanic or not) who have played it well.
Here are the best:
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5. Barillo (Willem Dafoe), Once Upon a Time in Mexico (Bonus Points: Dafoe is from Wisconsin)
4. Tuco (Raymond Cruz), “Breaking Bad”
3. Tony Montana (Al Pacino), Scarface (Bonus points: Pacino is of Italian descent)
2. Anton Chigurh (Javier Bardem), No Country for Old Men
And, though this is a SRL, while we’re on the subject of Machete, I’d also like to note that the full cast for the the movie — based on the above trailer — has come together. Co-directed by Robert Rodriguez and Ethan Maniquis, Machete will feature Danny Trejo, Jessica Alba, Michelle Rodriguez, Steven Seagal, Lindsay Lohan, Cheech Marin, Don Johnson and Jeff Fahey.
Oh, and Robert fucking DeNiro.
That’s one hell of a cast for a movie once thought to be headed straight-to-DVD.
The mustached man (who starred alongside Raymond Cruz) in Training Day was pretty goddam menacing, if you ask me. I know you didn't ask me, but had you have, that's the guy I woulda said. The guy from training day... He was in the same scene as Raymond Cruz. Who was also mentioned above as being menacing...
Have a good afternoon.
Posted by: Skitz at August 7, 2009 12:28 PM
El Guapo?
Posted by: amanda marie at August 7, 2009 12:29 PM
No Panchito Gomez in Tuff Turf?
I laugh at your list, maricon.
Posted by: BarbadoSlim at August 7, 2009 12:30 PM
My mom.
Or, wait, you mean movie characters?
Posted by: courtney at August 7, 2009 12:30 PM
Guillermo and Cesar on "Weeds". You just know Guillermo is going to have one hell of a revenge scheme against Nancy when he finally gets out.
As a Hispanic man, I fully endorse this list...pendejos.
Just remember: Gregory Peck was Hispanic too.
Posted by: Fredo at August 7, 2009 12:39 PM
It's good to see Trejo in a real movie. The only time I saw him in something good was The Devils Rejects and Spy Kids, and the other time, I saw him, sadly, in fucking Delta Farce. Good god, that movie sucked Larry the Cable Guy's ass hair. Poor guy.
Yeah, he's one note, but at least it's an awesome note.
Posted by: George at August 7, 2009 12:42 PM
The mustached man (who starred alongside Raymond Cruz) in Training Day was pretty goddam menacing, if you ask me.
That is a good one, Skitz. That's Cliff Curtis, who is actually from New Zealand, can grow a helluva mustache and also played Colombian druglord Pablo Escobar in Blow.
Posted by: branded at August 7, 2009 12:43 PM
Umm...Weevil? When he was still in high school he chained a traitorous gang member to an old baseball stadium that was being demolished.
Posted by: Austin asking for trouble at August 7, 2009 12:47 PM
Ah, Pablo Escobar. The sheer number of bullets required to take him down turned a simple hit by the U.S. Delta Force and the Colombian government into a thing of beauty.
Posted by: George at August 7, 2009 12:51 PM
Pedro from Napoleon Dynamite. I would not want to owe him money.
Posted by: Jason at August 7, 2009 12:52 PM
Y'all beat me to it on Cliff Curtis. That guy is a chameleon.
Posted by: DarthCorleone at August 7, 2009 12:58 PM
Austin asking for trouble - No he most certainly did not. The irish mob did that. Granted, they did it because Weevil framed the guy, but it was the micks that pulled the trigger on that one.
Posted by: elizabeth at August 7, 2009 12:58 PM
BTW, I was wrong on Peck (english, irish, scot). But there were people like Antonio Quinn (Anthony Quinn) and Margarita Carmen Cansino (Rita Hayworth) who found out that, to succeed in Hollywood, they'd have to hide their Latin heritage.
SO it's ironic that so many have become famous by playing Latin stereotypes.
"And whether he calls himself Doctor Zolo, Minister of Antiquities, or Colonel Zolo, Deputy Director of the Secret Police, he's still! Just! A butcher!"
Heinous omission.
Posted by: Todd at August 7, 2009 1:05 PM
OHMYFUCKINGOD!!! I can't believe they are going to make "Machete" and with that cast!!! Rodriguez might be able to redeem himself from the Rose McGowan debacle with this.
Also have to mention Cheech in "Desperado,"
"Your beer tastes like piss."
"That's cause we piss in it."
Almost anyone Luis Guzman plays. One could argue he gets stereotyped because of his face, but John C. Reilly has the same face and does not get cast as the thug.
And figgy it's that your internet persona is so damn huggable, I'm sure if we ever met you in person we'd quake from your brooding glower. Plus you're not from Mexica or Puerta Rica so are you really Hispanic? No.
Now Sofia, that's one bitch I wouldn't want to meet in a dark alley!
Posted by: ed newman at August 7, 2009 1:21 PM
C'mon, Edward James Olmos in American Me!
Posted by: Ang at August 7, 2009 1:09 PM
You beat me to it. Mostly because I was blanking on his name.
I call shenanigans. There's no way this list can be vaild without him on it.
BSlim...English please. I can't understand all you clicks and pops and rolling R's. And no, I don't know where el bano is. Move along.
Posted by: PissBoy at August 7, 2009 2:03 PM
Why is Linsey Lohan in Machete?
Posted by: jM at August 7, 2009 2:00 PM
Hey...they need topless whores in the movie don't they? After all, Machete knows the deal gets the ladies. And I imagine you'd need a machete to slice through her worn out slab of roast beef.
Posted by: PissBoy at August 7, 2009 2:08 PM
Are you a Mexi-CAN or a Mexi-CAN'T!?
Lord I love that movie.
Posted by: Codger at August 7, 2009 2:14 PM
That Taco Bell chihuahua always kinda freaked me out. He was just so damn intense. He really fucking wanted that shit and I did not want to get in his way.
Posted by: Odnon at August 7, 2009 2:15 PM
Vermillion, it happened in the L Word. Not a movie, but that's the only place I can think of.
Posted by: Maggie at August 7, 2009 2:16 PM
Wait, wait, wait! Ricardo Montalban. My GOD, how could we forget Khaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaan!!!!!!!
Rosie Perez from It Could Happen to You. Put me off my tortilla soup for a week.
Posted by: socalledonlycousins at August 7, 2009 2:21 PM
Danny Trejo was also in Heat.
My impression of Luis Guzman and his roles has never equated to thug. He's much more the lovable sidekick.
Posted by: DarthCorleone at August 7, 2009 2:29 PM
That girl who gave the chola make up lessons on YouTube. Thanks to her, I now have a debilitating fear of eyeliner.
Posted by: admin at August 7, 2009 2:35 PM
Might be some fine examples from Oz. Some extra scary fine examples.
Posted by: ponch at August 7, 2009 2:42 PM
Well im diggin the list.
With the exception of Willem Defoe my people are happy with the list.
Posted by: gilp at August 7, 2009 2:52 PM
And I imagine you'd need a machete to slice through her worn out slab of roast beef.
And now I'm imagining Danny Trejo chopping his way through that crimson house of horrors like a he's in the goddamn rainforest with chunks of flesh raining down and, Jesus, it's hard to type with slit wrists.
Posted by: jM at August 7, 2009 3:09 PM
No Sofía? You mean I'm not terrifying? Huh... I guess that's a good thing.
How can you mention Danny Trejo without mentioning Con Air, From Dusk Til Dawn, Desperado, Planet Terror... Dude is made of awesome. He is a cottage industry of "menacing Hispanic". And I'm not surprised to hear he's super nice in real life.
Posted by: MM at August 7, 2009 3:56 PM
hehehe "they just fucked with the Wrong Mexican..!"
Posted by: odnon at August 7, 2009 4:12 PM
The only thing you will hear before she strikes is the ominous chanting:
"Mah boooobs......mah boooooobs"
*shudder*
Posted by: Vermillion at August 7, 2009 3:51 PM
---------------------------------------------------
Does she kill you with her cleavage? 'Cause I think a lot of people here might be okay with going like that. Severely okay.
Posted by: Lauren at August 7, 2009 4:21 PM
Uh . . . Dora?! She'll cut a bitch two times quick.
Posted by: Tracer Bullet at August 7, 2009 4:24 PM
I don't think people would be okay with my cleavage killing them. It is one thing to have a killer cleavage, and a very different one to have assassin tits.
No, it's not that my breasts are so mesmerizingly gorgeous that the mere sight of them will kill you. I don't shoot bullets out of my nipples like a fembot would.
Vermillion got it partially right. You will see me coming to get you and there will be a soft chant. Children's voices, to be more specific. Mah boobs.... mah boobs... lala... lala..... There will be creamy-white fog in the air and overhead lights... You will see my shadowy face... you will see my shadowy clevage...
They say the last thing you see before you die is a ring. A nipple ring.
I am the stuff of kryptozoology. Am I real, am I fake? Some people have claimed to have walked away from me and live to tell their story. I can't confirm nor deny that. Maybe Pookie didn't get banned... maybe he was just another one of my preys... maybe the trauma was so hard on him he had to reinvent himself just so he could come back here and warn others.
I can't say, really. I'm just a non-menacing Hispanic.
Lou Diamond Phillips as Angel Guzman in Stand and Deliver.
Gang dude turns math wiz...some menace in the character, no?
Posted by: richmac at August 7, 2009 7:09 PM
Edward James Olmos in Miami Vice...the way he looks at them and says "Crockett....Tubbs" just chilling. It's like you know he did some bad shit in the day before he became a cop. It's all in the eyes.
Also have to mention Cheech in "Desperado,"
Well if you're going to mention Cheech in Desperadodammitjanet you might as well mention him in From Dusk Till Dawn which also had Danny Trejo as the fucking badass bartender. Aww what fuck, Trejo is a badass in everything he does.
Shouldn't we do like a worst hispanic list? I would put Marlon Brando in Viva Zapata! at the top of that motherfucker. It was like John Wayne in The Conqueror.
Could we also add John Leguizamo to this list? He's had a couple of good ones. Spun, Spawn, Romeo & Juliet, Land of the Dead. Or can you not be somewhat funny and menacing? Or is just because he's tiny?
Hey, I'm half Lithuanian - whatchoo got for me? Coldest Former Soviet Union Bitches?
Posted by: Cindy at August 7, 2009 9:02 PM
I'm sure that the Swedish-Danish character will be played by Jessica Alba, right?
Sweet Fancy Moses! If my bi-racial niece and nephew went around spitting venom at anyone who would dare to even suggest that they aren't whiter than the snow-capped peaks of Kilimanjaro, I would destroy them. And I'd be right to do it. Well, good thing her last name--Alba--doesn't give her away. Not fit to scrub Rita's counters.
Although, I guess the real champion of necessity morphing into self-hatred was Merle Oberon. You know, the actress whose mother was not half-Indian? Yeah, because she was the same actress that didn't spend the first eighteen years of her life in her native India. She went as far as having a portrait done after her mother's death, made to look as white as possible. Because they were all from England.
Raymond Burr, too. Fake wife, fake children, fake death, fake war vet! I mean, you have to feel for the guy who went to such absurd lengths because the times forced him to conceal his homosexuality. But it's still so weird. I mean, there's Stanislavski's dream, surgeons!
I like their dedication, that's AC-TING! They went far beyond doing what was necessary to work in their chosen fields, and propelled themselves into a proto-Sims fantasy world. Geez, what a world. And then you get your Gardners and your Woods stealing it out from under you. People have to put up with a lot of shit, huh. And her I am, moaning about ragweed and hayfever.
Posted by: Jo 'Mama' Besser at August 7, 2009 11:38 PM
heehee admin- 'now for some black sh*t so the esseys know you ain't playin'...god I can't even remember it all but it was golden.
And Sophia, you may not be a killer, but you paralyze 'em good.
Posted by: replica at August 8, 2009 1:33 AM
isn't the worst Hispanic Carlos Mencia?
It would be, Rubble, but Mencia's not actually Mexican. He's a German/Honduran whose real name is Ned Hollness.
That's right, one of the most successful comedians of the decade has based his entire career of of a blackface routine. A black president doesn't go nearly far enough to repair this kind of damage.
Posted by: George at August 8, 2009 5:46 PM
I
Posted by: MunkieButt at August 9, 2009 12:26 AM
Thanks for playing along, George. Being a fake makes him the worst of all. And the fact he calls his company NedLos means he knows he's a fraud but just doesn't care. He is a C-Bag.
I'm confused. The header says "menacing Hispanic characters" but while Bardem is Spanish, his character Anton Chigurh is ... what IS he supposed to be, exactly? "Anton" seems Eastern European, and I have no fuckin' idea what to even begin to think "Chigurh" is, other than 16 points in Scrabble. And it looks like McCarthy just arranged seven random letters on a tile holder.
Posted by: , (the commenter formerly known as bucdaddy) at August 10, 2009 12:14 AM
That lady who shot Selena sure scared me...
Posted by: K at August 10, 2009 7:10 AM
I hear the craft services table at any Danny Trejo movie is only stock with cigarettes, hard liquor, and knives.
Danny Trejo has a tattoo on his back of his kids on the beach. He was showing it to people at the LFCC a few weeks ago. I missed the tattoo show, but he was a lovely man.
Now, though, I'm not sure he can scare me on screen any more!
Posted by: Tarn at August 10, 2009 4:26 PM
I nominate Robert LaSardo-Escobar Gallardo in Nip/Tuck, plus numerous tv and movie roles.
Speaking of Merle Oberon-besides denying her Indian heritage, she used her mother as her personal maid (not assistant-that would imply some respect) without letting anyone know it was her mother.
Posted by: annecruz at August 21, 2009 2:45 PM
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You have done well Dustin. I was hoping for Trejo from Desperado, but hell, can't really beat Machete.