Fifteen years ago, their Washington Heights neighborhood was dubbed the crack-cocaine capital of the world, but today it is transforming into one of the most vibrant, Spanish-speaking communities in the United States. While the drug dealers continue to disappear, their violent legacy still casts a shadow over the neighborhood and its residents. Junior, an ex-convict struggling to get his life back on track, is a product of this legacy. His younger brother Manny, the salutatorian of his high school class, embodies the hope of the future. On the night of his graduation party, Manny finds himself faced with an ill-fated decision that could change his life forever
"Piñero" tells the story of the explosive life of a Latino icon, the gay poet-playwright-actor Miguel Piñero, whose urban poetry is recognized as a pre-cursor to rap and hip-hop. After doing time in hard-core Sing-Sing for petty thefts and drug dealing, Piñero's prison experiences developed into the 1974 Tony-nominated play Short Eyes. The resulting notoriety and fame was too much for the Latino bad-boy genius who retreated to the darker corners of New York City.
In this biographical drama, Selena Quintanilla is born into a musical Mexican-American family in Texas. Her father, Abraham, realizes that his young daughter is talented and begins performing with her at small venues. She finds success and falls for her guitarist, Chris Perez, who draws the ire of her father. Seeking mainstream stardom, Selena begins recording an English-language album which, tragically, she would never complete.
Mousie and Sad Girl are childhood best friends in a contemporary Los Angeles poor Hispanic neighborhood. But when Sad Girl becomes pregnant by Mousie's boyfriend, a drug dealer named Ernesto, the two become bitter enemies. While their dispute escalates towards violence, the violence of the world around them soon also impacts their lives.
During his 18 years in Folsom Prison, street-gang leader Santana rules over all the drug-and-murder activities behind bars. Upon his release, Santana goes back to his old neighborhood, intending to lead a peaceful, crime-free life. But his old gang buddies force him back into his old habits.
A taxi driver (Quaid) pounds Zen parables (if time money, is time the root of all evil?) into his passenger in a high-speed, idiosyncratic tour of their city's ethnic coteries. All the boy wants is to dispose of his date's dead dog and get back to the babe who's so hot she mutters darkly about being a pressure cooker.
Nothing is more important to Mexican-American Marta Delacruz than her quinceanera -- the traditional 15th birthday celebration that symbolically ushers a young girl into adulthood. Marta is understandably angry and resentful when her father cancels the gala event, but her outlook changes completely when she accidentally uncovers her father's secret: He never became a U.S. citizen.
A few years ago, a mysterious serial-killer caused panic on Crippen High School. The killer was never caught. A movie company, Cosmic Pictures, has decided to make a feature movie about these events - on location, at the now abandoned school. Since members of cast and crew disappear without a trace, it seems as if history is repeating itself...
Violent crime is routine. Organized drug trade runs rampant in the face of powerless authority. And a vicious street gang holds dominion with a savage reign of terror. Welcome to Lincoln High! Here the cobras rule the school and everyone in it. Everyone except for Jeff Hanna.
The new guy in a Los Angeles high school, Morgan, does some singing and fights hotshot Nick over disco dancer Frankie.
Eugene Griswold is an average, suburban nine-to-five guy tired of working long hours for his income. Then Eugene gets mixed up in his inventor friend Stanley Flynn's get-rich-quick scheme which lands them both in prison and eventually leads to a series of misadventures when they are caught up in a bizarre prison breakout made by other prisoners which they are blamed for mastermining it and now must run from the law.
Jeb Maynard is a patrolman guarding the U.S.-Mexican border, whose partner and buddy Scooter has just been murdered. Maynard knows that a smuggler of illegal aliens is responsible for Scooter's death, but the feds insist that drug dealers committed the crime.
A young Chicano gang member in Los Angeles comes to realize that the gang life is not what he really wants but doesn't know how to get out.