way before "get out", alpha studios was creating horror movies with a strong social component

By Will T. Laughlin

There's a simple difference between Islas and all-too-many of the others who have attempted to find new life in the same old graveyard: Islas has something urgent to say. He uses the conventions of traditional horror as a starting point, not as a destination. His movies may involve the supernatural, but they are always firmly grounded in Real Life.

The   day   of   the   dead

​For instance, one of Islas's major concerns in his US-made films is the struggle of the Hispanic population in the United States. His protagonists are often latinos & latinas struggling to keep their dignity, in the face of a White-dominated culture that sees them as either a threat, or an exploitable work force, or a marketable demographic, depending on the occasion... but never seems to see them as human beings, who are deserving of respect.

​Islas is obviously (and justifiably) angry at the systemic racism in America, but he never allows his anger to overwhelm his compassion. For example, the gang of murderers who change El Día de los Muertos (2007) from a slice-of-life drama into a horror movie are led by a fanatic white supremacist... but Islas takes pains to show us that the gang is not entirely white, nor male, nor even heterosexual. Racism is part of the problem, but the real issue is dehumanization: these people enjoy inflicting pain and terror on the powerless, and that kind of brutality underlies many more evils than just racism. Yet Islas also refuses to dehumanize his killers. He shows them to us as shockingly ordinary people, with ordinary lives and careers; and when the supernatural intrudes into their lives, looking for revenge, we feel an unexpected sympathy for them. Islas does not want us to be comfortable with anyone's suffering. The killers may be monsters, but they are human monsters, and we recognize that we are not so different from them as we would like to believe.

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