A significant aspect of Mexican intellectual thought has reflected on the!nbsp;tragic dimensions of national identity, with specific emphasis on the indigenous as long-suffering and stoic. Mexican critic Roger!nbsp;Bartra has dissected the discourse on Mexicanness, and noted the!nbsp;disparities in class between the philosophers and those they claim to!nbsp;represent. The films and videos in this program employ the signs of!nbsp;Mexicanidad with irony, social gest, and excess. Gámez's surreal masterpiece La formula secreta,!nbsp;honored with the main prize at the 1965 Experimental Film Competition,!nbsp;presents a series of evocative scenes of stoic charros, endless chains of!nbsp;hotdogs, and a Coca-Cola blood transfusion. Corazon sangrante, Ximena Cuevas's collaboration with!nbsp;the postmodern ranchera/performance artist Astrid Hadad, plays off the!nbsp;collage aesthetics of music video. It injects irony into the representation of!nbsp;pleasure and pain associated with the bleeding heart, an image that resonates!nbsp;not only in Catholicism but among pre-Cortesian religions. Buñuel's last!nbsp;Mexican film Simón del desierto (Simon of the Desert) illustrates his talents for unexpected!nbsp;moments of hyperbole and biting satire on the functions of Catholicism.!nbsp;