Calderón Productions and the Continuity of Mexican Industrial Cinema (1960-1980)

Abstract

This paper analyzes the problems that Mexican cinema faced after the end of its industrial boom in Latin America in the 1960s, based on a case study: the strategies of a family of producers, the Calderón brothers, known for making popular-style films. The article also seeks to elucidate the ways in which industrial filmmaking in Mexico sought the continuity in the markets and the attraction of audiences in times of modernization and transformation of social paradigms, and to determine the narrative and aesthetic alternatives promoted by these producers in their films from the sixties to the eighties in order to achieve their permanence in the industry in the midst of the crisis. To this end, a general overview of the state of Mexican cinema at that turning point will be laid out in order to contextualize the case study. Through this methodological approach the aesthetic and narrative proposals put forward by the Calderóns will be listed, establishing a confluence between the context of crisis in Mexican filmmaking, the trend of aesthetic innovation and reflexivity of the so-called new Latin American cinemas that emerged simultaneously, and theproposals of the Calderóns in pursuit of attracting audiences through the genres employed duringthese years (fantastic and horror films, wrestling films and ficheras films). The results obtainedreaffirm the existence of a confrontation of tendencies in the Mexican cinema of the period thatopposes industrialist cinema with high culture.