La Bamba

The new interpretation of "La Bamba" sung by the dynamic young L.A. band Las Cafeteras isn't your abuelito's version of the classic Mexican folk tune. Nor is it Ritchie Valens' 1958 hit rendition, or Los Lobos' smash 1987 remake. So what's different about Las Cafeteras' "La Bamba Rebelde" (The Rebel La Bamba), which appears on the group's just-issued CD "It's Time"? For starters, there are the punchy, quasi-hip-hop vocal cadences that overlay the traditional instrumental matrix of 10-string jarana and four-string requinto guitars known as son jarocho . Then there are the very L.A., very timely lyrical updates.

A few minutes before a screening of "Filly Brown" last week, Oscar-nominated actor Edward James Olmos tried to explain why the new family drama about a female Los Angeles street poet "is the most hopeful film I've ever worked on in my life. " Olmos, 66, had gathered in a backroom at Universal CityWalk's AMC theaters with his costar and longtime friend Lou Diamond Phillips, 51, and Gina Rodriguez, 28, whose performance as an aspiring rap star helped land "Filly Brown" a spot at the 2012 Sundance Film Festival.

A benefit screening of "La Bamba" will be held at the Directors Guild Theatre at 8 tonight in support of the Hollywood Sunset Community Clinic, which serves families in central Los Angeles. The hosts of the program, which will begin with a supper at 7 p.m., are Marcy Carsey and Tom Werner, co-producers of "The Cosby Show," and television director Peter Werner.

The new interpretation of "La Bamba" sung by the dynamic young L.A. band Las Cafeteras isn't your abuelito's version of the classic Mexican folk tune. Nor is it Ritchie Valens' 1958 hit rendition, or Los Lobos' smash 1987 remake. So what's different about Las Cafeteras' "La Bamba Rebelde" (The Rebel La Bamba), which appears on the group's just-issued CD "It's Time"? For starters, there are the punchy, quasi-hip-hop vocal cadences that overlay the traditional instrumental matrix of 10-string jarana and four-string requinto guitars known as son jarocho . Then there are the very L.A., very timely lyrical updates.

Most of the news interest in Columbia Pictures' current hit movie "La Bamba" has focused on the studio's successful penetration of the Latino film-going audience through the release in certain theaters of a dubbed Spanish-language version. It was a wise marketing decision and one that is certain to launch a trend in the American film industry. But the dubbing process, the use of voice actors to re-record dialogue in Spanish, is hardly the technical story of "La Bamba."

Lou Diamond Phillips' latest role is causing controversy among Navajos, but South Dakota Sioux are honoring the multiracial actor for his portrayals of American Indians. The Sioux have given Phillips, 28, star of the 1987 film "La Bamba," the honorary name Starkeeper, publicist Eddie Michaels said last week. The tribe will officially confer the name on Phillips at a ceremony later this year in the Black Hills of South Dakota, Michaels said.

"La Bamba's" bow in Latino movie houses this weekend may have marked a turning point in the marketing of mainstream films to the Latino community, if its opening is any indication. Studio officials and Hollywood movie analysts suggest that if "La Bamba" continues to draw big crowds at Latino theaters, Hollywood will direct more non-action films at the Latino market.

Anyone who's spent the past few years watching MTV knows this much: Marketing is the real art form of the '80s. For the unconvinced, we recommend MTV's "La Bamba" movie-premiere party, an hourlong special filmed last weekend at the Palace, which airs tonight at 6 on the 24-hour video channel. The program features live performances by artists like Los Lobos and Brian Setzer, as well as interviews with a host of celebrities.

"This isn't MGM in the '30s," Esai (pronounced E-sigh) Morales says between bites of Chinese chicken salad. "We've finally gotten to the point as a society where we realize we don't have to worship these people, these actors, that we pay so damn well. If they don't measure up--as personalities or as professionals--then the next generation is right around the corner."

Actor LOU DIAMOND PHILLIPS and his wife, JULIE CYPHER, are first-time home buyers, closing escrow last Tuesday on a house built in the '20s in the Hollywood Hills. "We looked on and off for close to a year, because we'd look and then he'd be off making a movie for four months," said Constance Chestnut of Jack Hupp & Associates, who represented the young couple in the $1-million deal.

In 1958, San Fernando Valley native Ritchie Valens climbed the U.S. pop charts with a butt-kicking little tune called "La Bamba. " According to the song's Spanish-language lyrics, dancing to it properly required "a little grace" and a little bit of something else. Few teenagers bopping to "La Bamba" probably realized they were jumping around to a rock-a-fied version of son jarocho , a structurally elegant but high-spirited fusion of Afro-Caribbean beats and often wise-cracking wordplay on timely political topics.

Lou Diamond Phillips is having a very good year. It's long overdue. In the 25 years since he burst onto the big screen as singer Ritchie Valens in "La Bamba," LDP (as he is often referred to) has been working nonstop, though sometimes a bit under the radar. But in January, his independent film "Filly Brown"had its premiere to rave reviews at the Sundance film festival. A guest appearance as a hot-headed cop on"Southland" left the door open for future episodes, and a hosting gig on the Military Channel's "An Officer and a Movie" propelled the little cable channel that began in 2005 to its best quarter ever.

Bob Keane, who founded the West Coast independent label Del-Fi Records in the 1950s and is best known for discovering and recording rock legend Ritchie Valens, has died. He was 87. Keane, who survived non- Hodgkins lymphoma diagnosed when he was 80, died of renal failure Saturday in an assisted living home in Hollywood, said his son, Tom Keane. "He was like the original independent record man in those days," said Tom Keane, a songwriter and record producer. "He was the guy going out and finding talent and developing it and getting it out to the masses."

It isn't often that a Hollywood eminence sets out to make a film but winds up doing it as a stage musical instead. But that's what's happened for Taylor Hackford. The director, known for his biographical features about Chuck Berry ("Chuck Berry Hail! Hail! Rock 'n' Roll"), Ritchie Valens ("La Bamba") and Ray Charles ("Ray"), had a vision for another '50s-rooted showbiz saga, about the Las Vegas lounge duo Louis Prima and Keely Smith. It will take shape in the first professional public stage-directing gig of his career: a retooled version of "Louis & Keely: Live at the Sahara," which was a critical and box office hit last year in two local 99-seat houses: Sacred Fools Theater and the Matrix Theatre.

Despite its location near the summit of Burbank's wind-swept Glenoaks Boulevard, La Bamba fancies itself as an island restaurant. Go figure. Oh, the menu does read like an index of tropical place names--Key Largo chicken, St. Thomas burrito, Panama shrimp and other equatorial-sounding nibbles. Plus, it's fun to sip the various licuados --tropical milkshakes made from such fruits as mamey, papaya and mango--out here on La Bamba's terraced outdoor patio.

Some rock bands love success so much that, having grasped it once, they'll try time and again to repeat the magic formula. Good bands know they have to move on. Los Lobos' chance to make a bargain with the devil came in 1987, when the Los Angeles band scored a surprise hit with a remake of Ritchie Valens' rocked-up rendition of the Mexican folk tune "La Bamba."

Music was the principal focus of Latino rocker Ritchie Valens' life but the only importance placed on music at the "La Bamba" party at the Palace on Friday night was its value as a marketing tool. The event, which included brief sets by Los Lobos and other artists on the sound track album, was a classic Hollywood schmooze with a predominantly movie industry crowd plus some representatives of the local music scene and members of Valens' family.

Most people know the group Los Lobos for their title song to the popular film "La Bamba." For the past month, however, members of the Latino community have been seeing--and hearing--advertisements for a new album the group recently recorded in Spanish for Warner Brothers records. And the agency behind the $500,000 ad campaign for the album, "La Pistola y el Corazon," (The Pistol and the Heart) is the Hispanic Group, a year-old Culver City company.

Yes, it was my idea for women dressed as Frida Kahlo to picket New Line Cinema over the casting of a non-Hispanic actress in the role of Mexican artist Frida Kahlo. You are correct in identifying me as "spearheading the protest" (Calendar, Aug. 2). You are inaccurate, however, in saying that "Ortelli says she places much of the blame on co-screenwriter and director Luis Valdez." What I said was, "Several people have called Luis Valdez, have tried to meet with him. He has not returned their calls."

First of all, I'd like to state that as a professional musician/artist I've always viewed Los Lobos as first-rate artists, musicians and trailblazers. Prior to their commercial hit "La Bamba," they had already been internationally acknowledged as an important new group of artists. Their endeavors to break new artistic ground are second to none. Louis Perez's July 4 comments about the "Latino Legends of Rock 'n' Roll" concert held at the Greek Theatre on July 6 did not disturb me. Perez was supporting more shows like these throughout the year, as opposed to special, one-time only concerts featuring Latino artists on Cinco de Mayo or Sept.