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Filming Locations
La Bamba was filmed almost entirely on location in Los Angeles, California. Director Luis Valdez and the film's location manager, Richard Davis, wanted to include as many spaces from the San Fernando Valley as possible where Richie Valens and his family lived their lives. In an interview with Richard Davis, he describes Luis Valdez wanting "as many places that were actually in the story" to be included in the film so as to preserve the location's historical significance." For example, the film's opening sequence is filmed at Pacoima Junior High School where Richie Valens attended with his best friend. The sequence is a dramatization of the events on January 31, 1957, when two airplanes collided over Pacoima and the falling debris killed three students at Pacoima Junior High School, including Richie Valens' best friend. The death of his friend would influence Richie Valens' fear of flying in airplanes. Towards the end of the film, shots of the funeral procession pulling into the cemetery was filmed at the San Fernando Mission Cemetery at 1160 Stranwood Ave in Mission Hills, the real resting place of Richie Valens. Louis Valdez insisted on filming at Valens' final resting place, although Richard Davis stated the cemetery wasn't a very scenic place to shoot. The crew also ran into obstacles with the Catholic Church who was opposed to filming on location.

Hispanic Hollywood and Chicano Cinema
La Bamba was one of several films to be released during the Hispanic Hollywood period in the American film industry, alongside films like Stand and Deliver, Born in East L.A. and The Milagro Beanfield War, which are films made by hispanic filmmakers containing hispanic themes. These films were made in part of Hollywood's attempt to target a highly profitable Spanish-speaking film audience after the notable box-office success of La Bamba. After the film's release, Victor Valle from The New York Times predicted that La Bamba "may have marked a turning point in the marketing of mainstream films to the Latino community."

Director Luis Valdez was an active member of the Chicano movement who served as one of the four authors of the Plan Espiritual de Atzlán, a Chicano ideology manifesto. He also contributed to the Chicano movement by creating the El Teatro Campesino (The Farm Worker's Theatre) in 1965. Valdez's involvement in the Chicano movement and his study of Chicano nationalism are present in La Bamba. The opening dream sequence that foreshadows Richie Valens' death at the end of the film, for example, signifies Louis Valdez's study of neo-Mayan and Aztec philosophy and the Chicano folk practice of psychic readings of the future.

La Bamba also reveals themes related to Chicano cultural nationalism and their identification with Mexican history and the transformation of Mexican culture. For example, when Richie Valens travels across the border to Tijuana and first hears "La Bamba," he becomes inspired by the Mexican folk song and adapts it into a rock n roll version upon his return to California.

La Bamba appealed to Chicano activist audiences, as it was one of the first commercially successful films to feature a Chicano activist as the main protagonist. Prior to La Bamba, audiences had mostly experienced stereotypical representations of male, Mexican gangsters. The film also experienced complaints about the Filipino actor Lou Diamond Phillips playing the role of real life Chicano, to which Luis Valdez responded: "Why not? The Filipinos are the Hispanics of Asia, what’s the problem?"