MovieChat Forums > No Mercy (1986) Discussion > Hollywood’s tired portrayal of Cajuns

Hollywood’s tired portrayal of Cajuns


Apparently Cajun people have just not learned to complain as a group. No Mercy shows no mercy in the tired portrayal of Cajuns as violent, ignorant, isolated, inbred sexual abusers who live in the backwoods swamp and invariably spend all their lives fishing for crawfish and collecting junk cars. Does anyone know a movie where Cajuns are portrayed in a positive, normal light?

reply

It's a work of fiction. In real life, Cajuns are smart enough not to let it bother them.

reply

Louisiana’s foremost Cajun scholar and Professor Emeritus in Francophone Studies at the University of Louisiana Lafayette with his Ph.D. in Études Créoles (anthropology and linguistics) from the Université de Provence Aix-Marseille seems to feel otherwise:

https://www.folkstreams.net/contexts/cajuns-in-film-by-barry-jean-ancelet

reply

To be fair this movie has poor portrayals of everybody.

The director stated the portrayals of Cajuns, Algiers, and the bayou was all fictional

reply