LOS ANGELES _ The idea that one day all immigrants, all Mexicans or all Latinos will stop working and buying _ in order to show the rest of the United States how important they are for the economy _ has been around for years in the Hispanic community. But the latest thought is about trying to put it in practice on Monday, May 1.

The exercise of imagining what would happen in the United States if, all of a sudden, millions of its inhabitants disappeared was explored in the 2004 film, "A Day Without a Mexican," by director Sergio Arau. The movie _ a mix of satire, humor and social critic _ describes the chaos, disconcertion and tragedy in a fictitious California, when a strange cloud makes all Mexicans temporarily disappear: all of them whether undocumented immigrants, legal residents or American citizens.

The idea for the movie was based on a visit Arau and actress Yareli Arizmendi made to New York several years ago. They saw the huge impact the closings of museums and galleries had in "a day without art," to make people appreciate the contributions of artists who had died of AIDS. And it occurred to them to apply the same idea but with Mexicans.

"Ignorance and fear equal hatred," Arizmendi told me, referring to the prevailing anti-immigrant climate when the movie was conceived.

The result of that experience was, first, a short film and then the movie that opened in the summer of 2004.

Thousands of Hispanics saw the film, which received wide coverage in the Spanish language media.

"And what would happen if what the movie proposes becomes a reality one day?" I heard over and over again, more as speculation than as a concrete project.

But there are ideas that become unstoppable and take on a life of their own. And that is how the idea about the May 1 boycott came about (which, ironically, is when Labor Day is celebrated in Latin America).

Several Hispanic organizations have decided not to join the national strike in order to avoid massive dismissals or a negative reaction in the U.S. Senate _ where immigration reform is being debated _ and rejection among the American population. But no matter how successful the boycott might be, the very idea that it can be carried out already shows a new Hispanic power and unity among Latinos never seen before.

Hispanic political power is very limited; there are only a governor, three senators and 22 congressmen of Hispanic origin. But the real power of Hispanics lies in their growing numbers. There are almost 50 million of them (including the undocumented) and they will become greater in number. By the year 2125, there will be more Hispanics than (non-Hispanic) whites in the United States.

This newly found power was on display for everybody to see when a few weeks ago, hundreds of thousands of people were marching peacefully in cities like Los Angeles, Chicago and Washington, among others, demanding the legalization of undocumented immigrants and criticizing the proposal (passed in the Chamber of Representatives) to consider them criminals.

The demonstrations were historical, as much for their sheer numbers as for their message and organization. And we were all taken by surprise. They produced in many Hispanics that combined feeling of amazement and joy that comes when you see a baby taking its first steps.
Nobody foresaw the amount of people that would take to the streets and that those marches would have such a strong impact on the immigration debate in Congress. The most surprising of all is that both the boycott and the marches have materialized without visible leaders. The marches are more the product of a people's movement _ based on frustration with the immigration laws and the mistreatment of the undocumented _ than the work of visionaries.

But, really, it is not necessary to wait for Monday's boycott to see what would happen in the United States without immigrants or without Latinos: The movie "A Day Without a Mexican" shows it in a very crude and effective way.

"What is invisible for most people will become visible," Arau told me as he explained the goal of his film in an old interview that I pulled from my files.

And that is exactly what might happen with the boycott: The importance of Latinos and immigrants will become visible, something that has until now been invisible for millions of Americans.

The end of the movie "A Day Without a Mexican" is ingenious: a U.S. immigration agent, instead of thwarting the entry of illegal immigrants from Mexico, gives the first Mexican illegally crossing the border a big and effusive welcome-to-America hug.