LOS ANGELES - Jennifer Lopez will receive an award
for her work as producer and star of a film examining the murders of hundreds of
women in a Mexican border town, Amnesty International officials said Friday.
Jennifer Lopez(File photo)
Lopez will receive the Artists for Amnesty award Feb. 14 at the Berlin Film
Festival from Nobel Peace Prize winner Jose Ramos-Horta. The film "Bordertown"
will make its debut Feb. 15 at the festival.
In "Bordertown," Lopez plays an investigative journalist reporting on the
serial killings of women in the border city of Juarez, Mexico. Directed by
Gregory Nava, the film also stars Antonio Banderas and Martin Sheen.
"Since first hearing of these atrocities in 1998, when Gregory Nava came to
me with this project, I desperately wanted to tell this story," Lopez said. "I
began working to ensure we made this film in order to bring the attention of the
world to this tragedy and to pressure the Mexican government to bring to justice
those responsible for these horrible crimes."
Lopez, 36, screened the film for some of the mothers of women killed in
Juarez and will receive special recognition from Norma Andrade, co-founder of
Nuestras Hijas de Regreso a Casa (Bring Our Daughters Home), an organization
comprising mothers and families of the murdered women of Juarez.