Mr. Van Sant, I just watched your film "Mala Noche" and I found it really sad and appalling that such a spectacular piece of art was so blatantly racist and bigoted. I was at first enthralled by the dark images and experimental camera work, style, and transitions. I loved the way you played with space on the screen- forcing the viewers to search for the flickers of light that would break up the pitch black- searching for information, letting oneself be guided by the narration to make sense of the powerful images. I liked how the camera, like the viewer, would slowly pan and search the space for meaning, finally resting on a subject and slowly revealing meaning. However, no matter how great a piece of art, it could never justify racism and bigoted statements. I was deeply offended how the character of your film would spit out these horrible statements like 'The Mexicans were stupid, that's why they were there on the corner looking for work,' just to mention one example. I was really upset not just by the bigoted statements of the main character, but also how the characters were displayed as buffoons; constantly making fools of themselves; with no real character depth. All characters of color in your film were portrayed as sub-humans who's purpose in life was merely as distractions to Walt, the intellectual and the only responsible, reasonable and cultured person in the film. To justify the racism of film by saying that your character Walt is the racist and you were just trying to portray the reality of the time period in Organ is no excuse. It was no excuse for skin heads and the Nazi film makers in the 40's and it is no excuse today. The only way a film maker could legitimately portray the reality of racism in a film is to either provide feedback through other voices or through actions and behavior of other characters in the film to negate the racist statements and show the reality that the characters views are just racist views of the character and not statements made by the film. You do non of that in Male Noche, and the actions and behaviors of the characters of color only prove the racist statements of Walt as truth. I watched your interviews and searched online to find interviews where you would at least acknowledge or apologize for overt racism of the film, but I was further disappointed when I found nothing. Your film Mala Noche, in my book, will be remembered in film history as the first bigoted and racist gay film, and not as a true piece of art.
Review of Mala Noche
