How Latin Music & Film Are Joining Forces to Tell Authentic Stories: ‘Everyone Wants to Put Us in a Box’

The convergence of movie and euphony arsenic almighty vehicles for taste storytelling took halfway signifier connected Tuesday (Oct. 21) astatine Billboard Latin Music Week 2025.

Presented by Sony Pictures, Sony Music Latin, and Rancho Humilde, the “Shaping the Future of Film and Music” sheet astatine the Fillmore Miami Beach brought unneurotic manufacture leaders Afo Verde (chairman and CEO, Sony Music Latin Iberia), Jimmy Humilde (CEO and founder, Rancho Humilde), and Sanford Panitch (president, Sony Pictures Motion Picture Group). Moderated by Billboard’s Leila Cobo, the sheet unpacked strategies and collaborations betwixt euphony and cinema that item taste movements and elevate underrepresented communities.

For Humilde, the explosive maturation of Rancho Humilde during the pandemic fueled the thought of creating a level for storytelling done film. “When COVID happened, my concern spouse Jay Dee [of Herencia de Patrones] and I sat determination coming up with what’s next,” helium said. “The satellite stopped — that’s erstwhile Rancho Humilde was born. [We went] from millions to hundreds of millions, wherever everyone was proceeding what we were doing, but nary 1 truly understood our culture.” This realization acceptable the signifier for Rancho Humilde’s introduction into filmmaking.

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Humilde envisioned this arsenic a solemnisation of Mexican-American culture, not confined to immoderate accepted genre oregon region. “Everyone wants to enactment america successful a box, successful a abstraction that we can’t turn retired of. But we’re saying, no, this is the time. This has been done successful pop, hip-hop, rap, successful films similar Boyz n the Hood and Friday with Ice Cube. Now we request to person it successful Latin music.”

“Hollywood has had an unthinkable past of transferring the energy of an creator to an actor,” Panitch remarked. “Latino audiences marque up 30 to 40% of the container bureau connected each movie, which reflects the unthinkable accidental to archer fresh, authentic stories that resonate.” Humilde added, “The large percent of moviegoers are Latinos. Thank God that the bulk are Mexican Americans, 65% successful the U.S. &...