Gender Violence at the U.S.–Mexico Border: Media Representation and Public Response

4. Representations of Femicide in Border Cinema

Introduction to Chapter 4 In this chapter María Socorro Tabuenca Córdoba analyzes how the victimization of women in Ciudad Juárez is represented in recent Mexican films. As with other chapters in this book, Tabuenca’s work addresses the problematical representation of violence and its cultural and political implications. Her arguments help us understand the way patriarchal values are disseminated through the film industry. Based on the examination of three films, Tabuenca explores the process of representation on which the border’s patriarchal culture is formed. She considers two main features of patriarchal society: (1) that such a society is constructed around a masculine figure and (2) that it is constructed around the family. In both cases Tabuenca points out the failures of traditional views to offer a response to the problem of violence. Films plotted around the masculine figure exalt the police as a central actor, whose heroic performance will save society from bad men who kill women. In contrast with the opinions of most Mexican advocacy groups and the relatives of victims of femicide, these masculine-plotted films back the position of authority figures who justify ineffective investigations by blaming femicide victims for their own deaths, citing an exogenous violent population, and by relying exclusively on official police criterion for their investigations . As Tabuenca notes, intelligence and the capacity for action are reserved for male characters, while women are typically characterized as passive and dependent on men. Films plotted around the family emphasize the conservative view that crime is a result of the deterioration of traditional values. It is important to underline the contrast between the depiction of a corrupt and indolent police force (as offered in chapter 2 by the mothers and activists interviewed by Patricia Ravelo Blancas) or that of homophobic abuse by Tijuana policemen (alluded to in chapter 1 by Debra A. Castillo, María Gudelia Rangel Gómez, and Armando Rosas Solís) and the selection made by Tabuenca, which focuses on low-budget films and aims 80 Introduction to Chapter 4 to describe the conservative values that are transmitted to working-class audiences. This same view is present throughout the mass media, in television , as discussed in chapter 3 by Héctor Domínguez-Ruvalcaba, and in newspapers, as discussed in chapter 5 by Ignacio Corona. Tabuenca’s particular selection of films does not imply that the film industry has been predominantly conservative, however. Feminist and nonfamily-centered works have been produced, including documentaries mentioned in her chapter and such U.S. films as Bordertown (directed by Gregory Nava, 2007) and The Virgin of Juárez (directed by Kevin James Dobson, 2006), where the investigation of femicide is conducted by women and the fight for human rights is the expressed purpose of the film. In recent years violence has been a topic of growing public and academic interest across disciplines and geographic boundaries.1 One reason for this is that the mass media saturate the public with violent images from all over the world. The philosopher Alejandro Tomasini Bassols (36) has described this constant bombardment as a distinctly modern development: “There is perhaps a sense in which the great technological revolution of our times gave a new face to violence and has gradually modified our attitude toward it. . . . The cultural ideals that are promoted , the symbols for the masses, are certainly of violent beings, not of gentle beings.”2 It seems that violence becomes less and less astonishing by the day. Still, we are shocked to find out that students, ex-Marines, religious fanatics, or lonely vagabonds have fired weapons against children in schools, patrons of restaurants, and groups of people in shopping malls, or that someone has strategically detonated a car bomb in a crowded market place. Hearing about the victims of pedophiles, rapists, or serial killers is also undoubtedly disturbing. But most people quickly forget or compartmentalize these violent events because they are considered foreign , part of a different world, despite the fact that many of us (including myself) inhabit reputedly dangerous cities.3 chapter 4 Representations of Femicide in Border Cinema maría socorro tabuenca córdoba Representations . . . do not simply copy the world, they produce versions of it. Consequently, representations are involved in the production of a version of the world. They do not simply copy it. A further position is reached when it is maintained that the repre­ sentation is centrally involved in the...