Universal City, California— La Llorona, whose fearful story of melancholy and murder has terrified Mexican and Latin American children for generations, will cast a grim shadow upon guests at Universal Studios HollywoodSM this fall as her dreaded presence is unleashed upon guests at the 2010 Halloween Horror Nights® event, where the legends of horror come to life.

According to the legend, a beautiful Mexican woman fell in love and married the most handsome man in the village. She bore two beautiful children, but her husband soon fell in love with another woman. Blinded by jealousy, the woman ran with her children to a river, where her faithless husband was courting his new love. Enraged, she threw her children into the river, where the current carried them away. When she realized what she had done, she threw herself into the river as well.

But the woman did not leave this Earth. Late at night, in the deep woods, or by a small creek, children can hear her weeping, searching in vain for her lost children. “La Llorona,(“the crying woman”) they call her, for she frequently wails “My children, where are my children?” Her frail, drenched body is a chilling sight; any child wandering alone is sure to be snatched as her newest victim.

At the 2010 Halloween Horror Night event, La Llorona will stalk guests as they make their way through the Universal back lot as part of the all-new “Terror Tram” experience and she’ll also terrorize her own “Scare Zone,” hiding within the shadows of a gauntlet haunted by the ghosts of her dead victims.

The 2010 “Halloween Horror Night” event at Universal Studios Hollywood will offer spine-chilling new mazes based upon the horror genre’s most compelling characters. Rob Zombie and other top artists are collaborating with Universal Studios Hollywood in the creation of new mazes, “scare zones” and backlot experiences. Additional new content for the 2010 Halloween Horror Nights mazes and attractions will be announced shortly.