The Taos News - Artes 2023
Quiet on set
New Mexico is becoming a go-to state for Hollywood film crews and TV shows. While Albuquerque and Santa Fe are popular locations, Taos and its environs have not been left out of the cinema fun. Here’s a look at some of the movies that were at least partia
Pictorial look at Hollywood in Northern New Mexico
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Christopher Walken and Rubén Blades in the 1988 comedy-drama MILAGRO BEANFIELD WAR. Maybe no film more encompasses Taos, having been a book and adapted screenplay written by local author John Nichols and filmed in nearby Truchas. On the film’s 30th anniversary in March 2018, Tempo Editor Rick Romancito wrote, ‘It started out as a much smaller movie. It was designed to help dramatize the hard-edged reality of life among Taoseños faced with the clash between water, land, culture and encroachment by wealthy interlopers promising progress. But when producer-director Robert Redford got hold of ‘The Milagro Beanfield War,’ a screenplay adapted from the novel by Taos author John Nichols, it became a whole different animal.’
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TORTILLA HEAVEN (2007) brought Hollywood down the road from Taos to Dixon and Picuris Pueblo, New Mexico. ‘Isidor’s Tortilla Heaven is the best restaurant in New Mexico maybe even the world,’ as the story line is described on IMDb.com. ‘But though his tortillas are scrumptious, his enchiladas divine, Isidor has never made a dime. Why? He lives in Falfurrias, population 73. One Sunday, while all the town — including his wife and son — are piously praying Mass, a miracle occurs. Upon one of his famous, handmade tortillas appears the face of Jesus Christ.’