I’ve watched Anthologies all my life. Growing up in the late ‘80s and early 90’s,my family and I all watched The Twilight Zone marathon every Thanksgiving andNew Year on KTLA Channel 5 then later when they moved to The Sci-Fi Channelor SyFy what it’s called nowadays. When I got into High school, I startedwatching Tales From The Crypt. Unlike The Twilight Zone, “Tales” was more outthere with gore and sometimes nudity but of course, how can you go wrong withthat? It also combined to things I enjoy the most: Horror and comedy. They’reboth alike because it’s all about timing whether it’s a jump scare or a punchline.“Twilight” & “Tales” both told great stories in less than half an hour a week. In thepast decade, I started diving into Anthology movies. Most notable ones includeTales From The Hood, Tales From The Crypt (1972), Creepshow, The ABCs ofDeath, and most recently the V/H/S franchise. Now, in 2023 we finally get ahorror anthology that involves Latin American folklore written and directed by 5awesome Latin directors. That movie? Satanic Hispanics!When police raid a house in El Paso, they find it full of dead Latinos, and onlyone survivor known as The Traveler (Efren Ramirez), and when they take him tothe station for questioning, he talks to two detectives: Detective Arden &Detective Gibbons (Greg Grunberg & Sonya Eddy) those lands are full of magicand talk about the horrors he’s encountered in his long time on this earth, aboutportals to other worlds, mythical creatures, demons and the undead.The wraparound segments as well as the finale was directed by Mike Mendez(Big Ass Spider!). Some wraparounds in horror anthology movies usually fall flatfor me (I’m looking at you V/H/S & V/H/S Viral!) and rather skip to the segmentsthemselves but this one really kept me entertained and had me cracking up atthe two detectives line deliveries every time they cut back to them after TheTraveler tells his stories. Also, the finale really pays off, and would love to seeThe Traveler come back in the future. The first segment titled “Tambien Lo Vi”was directed by Demián Ruga (Terrifed) and tells the story of a Rubik’s Cubeexpert who creates a portal with his flashlight to invite visitors from the dead.
Seems like a good idea, right? This segment had me jump a few times. It prettymuch takes place in a dark house and I hate the dark so this had me shakingseveral times. The next tale is titled: “El Vampiro” directed by Eduardo Sanchez(co-director of The Blair Witch Project). This one is the goofiest segment but Ireally enjoyed it since this is the kind of humor I like. It takes place on Halloweenwhen an ancient vampire is looking for victims to suck their blood but then hiswife calls him to remind him it’s daylight savings time. So it’s zany journey to getback home before the sunrises. Next up we have “Nahuales” directed by GigiSaul Guerrero (Bingo Hell and the upcoming biopic of Jenni Rivera) tells a verygrim tale that’s centered around shapeshifting Mesoamerican mythology. Thisone is the more serious segment out of all of them but Gigi knocks it outbeautifully filled with gore and frightening images. Finally, we have the finalsegment and it’s big and bold, and I can’t say too much about it because I don’twant to spoil this one. It’s called “The Hammer of Zanzibar” directed by AlejandroBrugués (Juan of The Dead) and it stars comedian Jonah Ray Rodrigues(MST3K). Without giving anything away, This one has Evil Dead II vibes andblends horror and comedy to make this segment work. There’s a fun fightsequence as well as a demon creature design I really enjoyed who’s perfectlyplayed by Morgana Ignis.So to wrap things up, I enjoyed the hell out of Satanic Hispanics. Usually inanthology movies, there are one or two segments that are weaker than the rest,but I’m happy to announce that there’s no bad segment in this and all 5 directorsknocked it out of the park. As a Latino filmmaker, I’m very proud to see this horroranthology all done by Latin filmmakers and would love to see more Latin basedanthologies in the future. Hopefully maybe even a sequel to this movie. I’m sureas hell that The Traveler has more stories to tell. So please go out and see thison the big screen wherever it’s playing and support Latin filmmakers