Word: bamba
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...more than $100 million, that led to the banner year. This season, with the exception of the Eddie Murphy triumph Beverly Hills Cop II, which has pulled in $151 million, a dozen or so lesser hits are doing the job. Among them: The Untouchables, Roxanne, Dirty Dancing and La Bamba...
...BAMBA...
...hits and a fatal plane crash. How many films can be squeezed out of this formula? O.K., The Buddy Holly Story and Patsy Cline's Sweet Dreams were good movies. But . . . La Bamba? Ritchie Valens was only 17 when he, Holly and J.P. ("Big Bopper") Richardson died in 1959. His music is surely worth remembering; his life is hardly worth dramatizing. So Writer-Director Luis Valdez shapes facts into fable. Valens' family is a chicano caricature; death forever stalks our shooting star; chunky Ritchie is made over into winsome Lou Diamond Phillips. Even the music (by Los Lobos) sounds thin...
...there is any doubt to this being the case, La Bamba should remove it. The movie seeks the cliche at every point, and, to its credit, finds what it's looking for. But the distressing aspect of the film--aside from the abysmal acting and poor directing--is the politics behind the story...
Right-wing groups trying to enforce assimilation are springing up everywhere. By the looks of La Bamba, they have gotten to some Hollywood directors. Ritchie Valens is the perfect poster child for U.S. English...