PBS unveils Hispanic Heritage Month doc line-up

August 17, 2012 by Kevin Ritchie

PBS will mark Hispanic Heritage Month with a series of documentaries and online programming exploring different facets of Latin American culture. Subjects will range from mariachi music and masked wrestlers to architecture and poetry.

Between September 28 and October 19, the U.S. pubcaster will broadcast ‘Voces on PBS,’ a documentary series that will kick off with Tales of Masked Men, about the world of lucha libre wrestlers.

Other docs that will air as part of the strand are Escaramuza: Riding From the Heart, about female rodeo riders vying to represent the U.S. at the National Charro Championships in Mexico; Unfinished Spaces, which recounts the Cuban Revolution through the architecture of Cuba’s National Schools of Art; and Lemon, about Puerto Rican poet/performer Lemon Andersen.

Doc strand ‘POV’ will air Natalia Almada’s El Velador (The Night Watchman) (pictured above), a film about a security guard who watches over the mausoleums of infamous Mexican drug lords, on September 27. Meanwhile, ‘Independent Lens’ will rebroadcast the docs The Longoria Affair and Waste Land.

Repeat programming that will air during Hispanic Heritage Month includes the PBS Arts special John Leguizamo’s Tales From a Ghetto Klown, a biopic about the comic actor’s career; Mariachi High, which follows a year in the life of high school musicians; and Not In Our Town: Light in the Darkness, about residents in Long Island, New York, who take action after an immigrant is killed.

Several hours of free programming honoring Latino culture will also be made available to view online via pbs.org.

Tags: El Velador (The Night Watchman), Escaramuza: Riding From the Heart, Hispanic Heritage Month, John Leguizamo's Tales From a Ghetto Klown, Lemon, Mariachi High, Not In Our Town: Light in the Darkness, PBS, Tales of Masked Men, The Longoria Affair, Unfinished Spaces, Voces on PBS, Waste Land

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