Latinos and Hispanics Underrepresented in Hollywood Movies, Per USC Report

• A brand new report discovered that lower than 6% of characters featured in movies in 2019 have been Latino. 
• Even when Latinos are featured in movies, these portrayals are sometimes riddled with stereotypes.
• The report supplied options from elevating funding for Latino artwork to hiring expertise for advert campaigns.

Hispanics and Latinos proceed to “face an epidemic of invisibility” in movie, based on a brand new report launched Wednesday by the USC Annenberg Inclusion Initiative. 

The report, printed along with the beginning of Hispanic Heritage Month, supplies an replace to its 2019 report titled “Inequality in 1,300 Popular Films.” 

Knowledge confirmed that lower than 6% of characters featured in movies launched in 2019 have been Hispanic or Latino. 

Illustration is equally dismal behind the digital camera. 

Of the 1,300 top-grossing movies launched from 2007-2019, there have been solely 12 particular person Latinx administrators. 

Two of those administrators, Melina Matsoukas and Steven Caple Jr., are Afro-Latino. 

“There’s always a lot of excuses about the talent pipeline,” Katherine Pieper, one of many authors of the research, instructed Insider. 

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“But it’s about decision-making and who’s being hired to work behind and in-front of the camera,” she added.

USC Annenberg Equality Initiative’s 2019 report additionally discovered that Hispanics and Latinos have been just about erased from the movie business, which is why Ariana Case, a lead writer of the newest report, did not discover these outcomes shocking. 

“We found a lot of numbers didn’t change,” Case instructed Insider. “We saw more of the same patterns that continue to erase Hispanic and Latino communities.” 

Greater than 60 million Hispanics, or round 18% of the nation’s inhabitants stay within the US. Los Angeles, the place the movie business is predominantly based mostly, is almost half Latino, per US Census Knowledge. 

Latinos are additionally common moviegovers, shopping for 25% of all film tickets, based on the report. 

Regardless of rising Latino communities and their shopper energy, the USC Annenberg Inclusion Initiative discovered that Latino audiences will not be prioritized by studios. 

Almost 80% of the 50 US states, Washington, DC, and Puerto Rico have the next share of Latinos than Hollywood movies, states the report. 

The dearth of Latino illustration in Hollywood is pervasive and impacts all features of filmmaking, the report states, discovering that round 3% of casting administrators and three% of producers are Latino. 

“Coco,” a 2017 film a couple of boy named Miguel who tries to reverse his household’s ban on music, was lauded for its Latino illustration.

Disney/Pixar


Case instructed Insider that even when Latinos are featured in movies, these portrayals are sometimes riddled with offensive and dangerous stereotypes. 

“We’re not seeing this multicultural, accurate portrayal of these communities,” she stated. 

In line with the research, almost 40% of the top-billed Hispanic and Latino characters in 2019 movies have been portrayed as criminals, whereas greater than 13% of the top-billed Hispanic and Latino characters in these movies have been depicted as decrease class or impoverished. 

Past being stereotypical, these roles are inclined to lack intersectionality. 

There wasn’t a single LGBTQ+ figuring out Latino character within the 2019 movies analyzed, even if Latino millennials are the least probably members of their age group to determine as heterosexual, per a 2018 College of Chicago study.

And just one Latino lead or co-lead in 2019 movies had a incapacity, regardless that 1 in 6 Hispanics do, based on the CDC. 

Due to the shortage of the Latino illustration in movie, there’s strain for the initiatives showcasing Latino characters to be the one, good movie for the entire of the group, stated Pieper. 

“It’s really hard to find a movies that check all the boxes,” Pieper stated. “So much then rests on these movies to carry the burden and the weight of representation.”

“I think the point is that we need more films,” Pieper added. “We need a plurality of representation so that not so much hinges on one or a few films to represent millions of people.” 

The report calls on these working within the movie business to implement a number of “strategic solutions for change” to handle the dearth of Latinos in motion pictures.  

For expertise companies and casting administrators, it recommends actively recruiting Latino expertise. It additionally instructs movie festivals to help Latino and Hispanic filmmakers. 

Philanthropists, companies, and elected officers may also play an necessary position in bolstering Latino illustration, per the report. 

From elevating funding for Latino artwork and schooling to hiring expertise for advert campaigns to creating laws that gives tax incentives for initiatives with Hispanic and Latino expertise, this concern will be attacked from a number of angles.