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A Day Without a Mexican in the U.S. state of California suddenly disappear. The film takes a satirical look at the range of effects on the (non-Latino, mostly White) Californians who remain.

is the distributor's first theatrical release and opened May 14, 2004 in limited release throughout Southern California and opened on September 17 in theaters in Chicago, Texas, Florida and New York City.

The film's tagline is "There will be no Mexicans in California."

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On-screen facts and statements

The film has a series of facts and statements which are written in white text on the screen throughtout the film. These facts and statements, in order of appearance, include:

Texas, California, Arizona, New Mexico, Colorado, Utah, Wyoming, and Nevada used to be part of MexicoDuring one of the film's many montages, the following conversation is heard in Spanish, and depicted in English subtitles:No way Telorino, the most popular name for babies being born in California is not Joe, or John, or Jack... its [sic] José. Yes sir, José!

According to the Social Security Administration, the top 5 male names in California in 2004 (source) were:

olOne of the characters says that, "90% of the crops in the State were picked by Mexican, undocumented workers, crossing the border..." One of the characters says, "They were saying, 'Latinos take $3 billion in social services and don't pay any taxes.' Turns out it's a big lie. There was $100 billion, we figured out, was what the Latinos were contributing to the economy of the State of California..." Presumably the filmmakers meant illegal aliens and not Latinos, since most Latinos do pay taxes.

Problems in the film

The main problems in the film have to do with terminology, the science of ethnicity, and the film's "pink fog".

generally refers to people whose background is from Spain, the Spanish-speaking countries of Latin America, or the original settlers of the traditionally Spanish- and Mexican-held Southwestern United States.

In the United States, generally refers to people living in the United States who are of Latin American background.

The film's title implies that it will be a film about the disappearance of Mexicans, but it is actually about the disapearance of Latinos. In this sense, the filmmakers seem to be guilty of the error pointed out by the film's factoid that, "every Hispanic on the West coast is presumed to be Mexican".

The film seems to use the terms Latino, Hispanic, Mexican, and illegal alien interchangably.

The pink fog

Similar to the film Left Behind, in which devout Christians disappear in the rapture, this film does not dwell on the mechanics of how Latinos disappear. The disappearance is coincidal with a "pink fog" which surrounds California. Nothing crosses the pink fog border, and it is said to be responsible for the lack of telephone and internet communications outside the State.