La Llorona goes Hollywood this Halloween
Originally published at The Preternatural Post. Please leave any comments there.
For more than 500 years La Llorona have terrified Latin American children. This Halloween, however, the Weeping Woman of legend has gone Hollywood in several frightening ways from being featured in tonight’s episode of Grimm to a newly reimagined haunted maze that is part of Universal Studios’ Halloween Horror Nights to a online video diary where celebrities share their memories and nightmares of La Llorona‘s horrifying and tragic tale.
The Legend of La Llorona
Maria is a beautiful girl from a small Mexican village who falls in love. Already a mother, she believes her children are standing in the way of her new love so she drowns them. After discovering what she has done, her lover will not have her. Alone and crying, Maria pursues her love relentlessly, to the point that he slits her throat perhaps disposing of her body in the same lake where she murdered her children. Maria is denied entry into Heaven until she finds her children. Now, unable to find them, Maria wanders the Earth for eternity as La Llorona, constantly weeping and searching in vain for her children. Sometimes even kidnapping other children hoping to fool the guards of Heaven.
Grimm takes on La Llorona
A series of child abductions are terrorizing the residents of Portland in the Halloween episode of the hit preternatural series Grimm. Unfortunately, it seems Portland isn’t the first community to experience these devastating abductions and the mysterious Detective Valentina Espinosa (Kate del Castillo) comes all the way from Albuquerque to try to catch the kidnapper who seems to be copying his (or her) crimes from the Mexican folktale known as La Llorona.
The more Nick digs into the case the more he realizes the roots of the La Llorona legend may lie deep within his own Grimm family history.
La Llorona Halloween Horror Nights Maze
La Llorona is returning to Universal Studios Hollywood’s Halloween Horror Nights in 2012 with a totally reimagined maze. La Llorona: Cazadora de Ninos or Weeping Woman: The Child Hunter features immersive environments that brings Maria’s legend to life.
“At its core, La Llorona is a ghost story so were’ building off the very successful elements of last years haunted attraction by adding brand new special effects that speak more to the paranormal side of the story,” explains John Mundy, Creative Director at Universal Studios Hollywood. “It’s like tapping into a child’s imagination and creating physical manifestations of those fears, leading to an even more terrifying experience.”
Latino stars record La Llorona video diaries
Speaking of childhood memories, many of today’s most popular latino and latina celebrities grew up hearing the story of La Llorona. For some, La Llorona is an urban legend. For others she is a means of getting children to listen to and obey their parents, a kind of crying version of Santa’s naughty list. Among the stars documenting their first recollections of the La Llorona legend are Wilmer Valderrama, Banda Reconditos, Luis Cruz (of the L.A. Dodgers) and Kate del Castillo (guest starring as Detective Espinosa in the La Llorona episode of Grimm) as well as other leading Latino/a celebrities.
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