The latest issue of UCLA's Chicano-studies journal Aztlan takes aim at the American Film Institute's exclusion of films directed by women and minorities in its much-publicized list of the 100 greatest American movies.

     Film historian and theorist Chon Noriega, faculty editor of Aztlan, the nation's preeminent scholarly journal in Chicano studies, charges that by excluding women, gays and racial minorities from both Hollywood and the history books that define American cinema, the nation is being robbed of its history. The 100 films on the institute's list, he said, were directed primarily by white men making big profits and headlines for the studios, and excludes independent films, documentaries, avant-garde cinema and short narratives.

     "Hollywood is not an equal-opportunity employer, and each year the employment numbers get a little worse," said Noriega. "This list is being done in our name, as Americans. When an industry and an institute team up to lay claim to the sum of our nationality, we lose the one thing they are claiming to preserve: our national heritage — a very complex, diverse and rich heritage."

     As a result of the list's lack of diversity, the UCLA Chicano Studies Research Center established its own AFI, the Aztlan Film Institute, and presented its own top 100 list. A blue-ribbon panel of 1,500 leaders from the Aztlan film community, "as well as President Clinton, Vice President Gore and the Taco Bell chihuahua," were sent ballots for nominations, Noriega said.

     Nearly 2,500 ballots were received. "We suspected the chihuahua," Noriega said, "but it was really democracy at work." Films were judged in four categories: documentaries, experimental, short or television narrative and feature films.

     "What this list presents is a provisional Chicano film and video heritage, one that remains outside the official histories of the American cinema," Noriega said. "Of course, we got so inclusive that we ended up with 149 titles in our top 100 list, but that's the price you pay."

     The institute cites, for example, the independent film "Please Don't Bury Me Alive/Por Favor" (No Me Entierren Vivo!)  (1976) as a pivotal film that inspired an independent film movement in Mexico. The low-budget film, directed by Mexican American Efrain Gutierrez, exposed barrio life in South Texas and served as an impetus for regional filmmaking.

     Other films that made the list: the experimental "My Trip in a '52 Ford" (1966) directed by Ernie Palomino; the documentaries "I Am Joaquin" (1969) by El Teatro Campesino and "America Tropical" (1971) directed by Jesœs Salvador Trevio; and feature films "El Norte" (1983) by Gregory Nava, "Heartbreaker" (1984) by Frank Zuniga and "La Bamba" (1987) by Luis Valdez.