Manuel Pérez Batista, a.k.a Manny Perez, is a Dominican American actor who made appearances in the TV show “Third Watch” and movie “Washington Heights”. Pérez was born in Baitoa, Santiago, and currently lives in Manhattan, New York. Bellow, we select a short interview made by California18 where he complains about the stereotyping of Latinos in the cinema.

“Actor and director Manny Pérez assures that, after decades of experience in Hollywood, he feels that expectations for Latinos in the world of cinema are changing “very slowly” because the community is not united in United States.

The Dominican filmmaker, who stood out internationally by directing and starring “La Soga” (2009) has just released his long-awaited sequel, “La Soga Salvation”, a film that once again shows the corruption and violence that many Dominicans face in their country and in U.S.

“What is happening in Hollywood for Latinos is a very slow change because they continue to offer us very stereotyped roles, although I always give them a heart so that the character is not so cliché,” he explains in an interview with Efe.

Thus, Pérez affirms that in the years “1940, 50 and 60” it was the Italians who assumed the “cliche” roles of the movies and now it has been the turn of the Latinos, although the situation “is improving”.

“I think the change is slow because we, as Latinos, are not one,” he reflects. We are Latino in the sense that we all came to the United States but we still have that proud air of being Dominican, Puerto Rican, Mexican or Colombian. And we don’t lean on Latino stories.”

The Dominican gave as an example that when “El Cantante” was released in 2006, a film that reviews the biography of Hector Lavoe, the film was not seen by Mexicans while “My Family”, shot in 1995 in the Mexican neighborhoods of Los Angeles, did not have the support of the Caribbean public.

“And at the end of the day, for the gringo, we are all Mexicans, so we have to support each other,” jokes the also director of the acclaimed “Washington Heights” (2002).

Now, the director hopes that the public will once again support films about the Dominican community with “La Soga Salvation”, which serves as a sequel to “La Soga”, a Dominican film that in 2009 crossed borders, became a phenomenon in the United States. States and arrived at the Toronto Film Festival.

In “La Soga Salvation” (also abbreviated as “La Soga 2), Pérez recovers the character of Luisito, a retired hitman in Rhode Island (USA) who tries to stay away from violence, until an inspector wants to hire him to take revenge on a drug dealer. Given the main character’s refusal, the inspector kidnaps his girlfriend so that she accepts the job.

“It is the story of a man who wants to find a normal life and cannot because his past is a conflict in his life,” Pérez explained.

With the first installment, the filmmaker won several awards for introducing in an action film a denunciation of corruption and injustice in the Dominican Republic.”

“In the second I wanted to touch on the personal life of the protagonist, but at the same time the script tells what is happening in Santo Domingo, even the villain of the film is a senator from the Dominican Republic,” he reasoned.