A promotion around the movie "The Curse of La Llorona" using traditional Mexican healers for "spiritual cleansings" before screenings of the horror film is drawing strong criticism from healers and scholars who say the stunts are offensive and demeaning.
Leading up to the Friday release of the movie based on a Mexican folktale, Warner Bros. invited healers known as curanderos to give audiences cleanings called "limpias." The studio also dispatched Cuban-born, Los Angeles-based healer Salvador Gata to "bless" an audience before the March 15 premiere at SXSW at The Paramount Theatre in Austin, Texas.
In addition, photos posted on social media show images of supposed healers providing ceremonial cleansings in front of posters of "The Curse of La Llorona," then celebrating as if attending a party.
This image released by Warner Bros. Pictures shows Jaynee-Lynne Kinchen, left, and Linda Cardellini in a scene from "The Curse of La Llorona." (Warner Bros. Pictures via AP)
"I'm working on the movie La Llorona and am looking for a curandero to do limpias before my movie screenings," publicist Nahir Wold wrote San Diego-based curandera Grace Sesma in an email. "Let me know if this is something you would be interested in doing!"
Sesma she ignored the invite until she started seeing photos of purported limpias at screenings online. That angered her and she posted the email on her Facebook page.
"I found it quite shameful," Sesma said. "It heightens the fear factor around a traditional practice and commodifies and exploits our culture just to get people to see their movie."
Wold did not immediately return emails and phone messages left by The Associated Press.
Tonita Gonzales, an internationally known curandera based in Albuquerque, called the promotion an "outrage and an appropriation" of Mexican American culture.
"The limpia is a cleansing that helps people see the holy that's within them," Gonzales said. "To us this to promote a movie, especially during (Easter Weekend), is disturbing."
Warner Bros. declined to comment when contacted by the AP.
"The Curse of La Llorona," starring Linda Cardellini and Raymond Cruz, centers on the Mexican folklore of La Llorona, a crying female spirit who takes children.
Curanderismo is the art of using traditional healing methods like herbs and plants to treat various ailments. Long practiced in Native American villages of Mexico and other parts of Latin America, curanderos also are found in New Mexico, south Texas, Arizona and California.
Anthropologists believe curanderismo remained popular among poor Latinos because they didn't have access to health care. But they say the field is gaining traction among those who seek to use alternative medicine.
A limpia is something performed for those suffering from a severe illness or trying to overcome trauma from sexual abuse, Sesma said. "It's not supposed to protect you from being scared at the movies.
University of New Mexico professor Eliseo "Cheo" Torres, who hosts an annual conference in Albuquerque on curanderismo, said the tale of La Llorona has nothing to do with curanderos, even if there are curanderos in the film. "I don't see the connection and this probably will be offensive to those practicing traditional healing," Torres said. "Whoever put this promotion together likely has no idea what they are doing."
Andrew Chesnut, the Bishop Walter F. Sullivan Chair in Catholic Studies at Virginia Commonwealth University and a scholar who has studied spiritual practices in Mexico, called the movie promotion "reprehensible" and harmful.
"It will only serve to further stigmatize curanderismo as something to be feared," Chesnut said. "That's dangerous, especially because of the climate that Mexican immigrants face right now."
Russell Contreras is a member of The Associated Press' race and ethnicity team. Follow him on Twitter at http://twitter.com/russcontreras
KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — A Ukrainian court on Friday ordered the detention of the country’s farm minister in the latest high-profile corruption investigation, while Kyiv security officials assessed how they can recover lost battlefield momentum in the war against Russia.
Ukraine’s High Anti-Corruption Court ruled that Agriculture Minister Oleksandr Solskyi should be held in custody for 60 days, but he was released after paying bail of 75 million hryvnias ($1.77 million), a statement said.
Ukraine’s National Anti-Corruption Bureau suspects Solskyi headed an organized crime group that between 2017 and 2021 unlawfully obtained land worth 291 million hryvnias ($6.85 million) and attempted to obtain other land worth 190 million hryvnias ($4.47 million).
Ukraine is trying to root out corruption that has long dogged the country. A dragnet over the past two years has seen Ukraine’s defense minister, top prosecutor, intelligence chief and other senior officials lose their jobs.
That has caused embarrassment and unease as Ukraine receives tens of billions of dollars in foreign aid to help fight Russia’s army, and the European Union and NATO have demanded widespread anti-graft measures before Kyiv can realize its ambition of joining the blocs.
In Ukraine's capital, doctors and ambulance crews evacuated patients from a children’s hospital on Friday after a video circulated online saying Russia planned to attack it.
Parents hefting bags of clothes, toys and food carried toddlers and led young children from the Kyiv City Children’s Hospital No. 1 on the outskirts of the city. Medics helped them into a fleet of waiting ambulances to be transported to other facilities.
In the video, a security official from Russian ally Belarus alleged that military personnel were based in the hospital. Kyiv city authorities said that the claim was “a lie and provocation.”
Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko said that civic authorities were awaiting an assessment from security services before deciding when it was safe to reopen the hospital.
“We cannot risk the lives of our children,” he said.
Meanwhile, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy was due to hold online talks Friday with the Ukraine Defense Contact Group, which has been the key international organization coordinating the delivery of weapons and other aid to Ukraine.
Zelenskyy said late Thursday that the meeting would discuss how to turn around Ukraine’s fortunes on the battlefield. The Kremlin’s forces have gained an edge over Kyiv’s army in recent months as Ukraine grappled with a shortage of ammunition and troops.
Russia, despite sustaining high losses, has been taking control of small settlements as part of its effort to drive deeper into eastern Ukraine after capturing the city of Avdiivka in February, the U.K. defense ministry said Friday.
It’s been slow going for the Kremlin’s troops in eastern Ukraine and is likely to stay that way, according to the Institute for the Study of War. However, the key hilltop town of Chasiv Yar is vulnerable to the Russian onslaught, which is using glide bombs — powerful Soviet-era weapons that were originally unguided but have been retrofitted with a navigational targeting system — that obliterate targets.
“Russian forces do pose a credible threat of seizing Chasiv Yar, although they may not be able to do so rapidly,” the Washington-based think tank said late Thursday.
It added that Russian commanders are likely seeking to advance as much as possible before the arrival in the coming weeks and months of new U.S. military aid, which was held up for six months by political differences in Congress.
While that U.S. help wasn’t forthcoming, Ukraine’s European partners didn’t pick up the slack, according to German’s Kiel Institute for the World Economy, which tracks Ukraine support.
“The European aid in recent months is nowhere near enough to fill the gap left by the lack of U.S. assistance, particularly in the area of ammunition and artillery shells,” it said in a report Thursday.
Ukraine is making a broad effort to take back the initiative in the war after more than two years of fighting. It plans to manufacture more of its own weapons in the future, and is clamping down on young people avoiding conscription, though it will take time to process and train any new recruits.
Jill Lawless contributed to this report.
Follow AP’s coverage of the war in Ukraine at https://apnews.com/hub/russia-ukraine
Ukrainian young acting student Gleb Batonskiy plays piano in a public park in Kyiv, Ukraine, Thursday, April 25, 2024. (AP Photo/Francisco Seco)
