Diego Luna: ‘There is violence against journalists and impunity because nothing is done about it’ The documentary ‘State of Silence,’ directed by Santiago Maza and produced by the Mexican actor and Gael García Bernal, portrays the dangerous conditions journalists face on a daily basis On May 15, 2017, journalist Javier Valdez was stopped by a white vehicle while driving in Culiacán, Mexico. Two hooded men pulled him out of his car and spoke to him for several minutes, according to testimonies compiled by the Sinaloa Prosecutor’s Office. In his final moments, Valdez was found kneeling with his hands on his thighs, wearing a hat — an image that haunts the memory of one of the most courageous reporters covering drug-related violence in the region.
He was shot 12 times. The case “should have been a watershed” to talk about justice, security and journalist protection, but it was not. Like much of Mexican society, filmmaker Diego Luna has experienced the violence firsthand.
The Valdez case posed the question of how bad things need to get before the public gets involved. “It is important we understand that what journalists are going through in our country affects us all in a way,” says Luna, an actor and the producer of the documentary State of Silence . “It is as if that was the departure point for this project that shows us what is behind the news that reaches us.
That was one of the objectives — to flag up who is involved; to get us to understand, even.