Columbus on Trial

TRT: 18 minutes, in English, Color, copyright: 1992, Featuring: Culture Clash

Inspired by the controversy surrounding the 500th anniversary of Christopher Columbus' "discovery" of America, Portillo fashions a fanciful version of a courtroom were Columbus to return from his grave to stand trial. Cross-examined by the Latino comedy group Culture Clash, Columbus is charged with atrocities against the Native peoples of the New World, including the rape and violent treatment of women. Satire and parody rule in this dynamic document about American history and colonization.

– Women Make Movies

"Lourdes Portillo's work with the irreverent comedy troupe Culture Clash, Columbus on Trial, is a nutty, technically superb staging of a court battle between Columbus (Herbert Siguenza) and an American Indian lawyer (Ric Salinas) that nobody really wins."

— Robert Koehler, L.A. Times, February 1993

“Like other Chicano films, Columbus on Trial contributes to the construction of a specific culture, and keeps the insurgent memory of Chicanos from being wiped out. In this regard, the vitality of the Chicano cinema participates in the real cultural flowering in the heart of the Chicano community."

— Le Monde, December 1993