El Norte

In the 1980s, military repression and civil warfare intensified in both Guatemala and El Salvador, resulting in massacres, forced displacement, and political assassinations. Thousands left Central America to come to America, most of them illegally. Those who entered the U.S. filed for political asylum but despite the reports of murders and disappearances, barely three percent of applicants received asylum. Today, approximately half of Salvadorans and Guatemalans living in the U.S. have less than an eighth grade education and most work long hours in jobs on the low end of the pay scale and their situation makes it nearly impossible to advance or make long term plans.

Gregory Nava's 1983 Indie film El Norte describes the plight of two young Guatemalans, Enrique (David Villalpando) and his sister Rosa (Zaide Silvia Gutierrez) who face reprisals from the military after participating in a protest meeting and undertake a hazardous journey to "the north" to find a better life. The film is divided into three parts: "Arturo Xuncax", describing the circumstances that caused the family to leave Guatemala "El Coyote", detailing their hazardous journey to reach the U.S., and "El Norte", telling the story of their life in Los Angeles. While El Norte does have a strong political message, the core of the film is the relationship between Enrique and Rosa.

The hardships of the journey are told in graphic detail, especially the last test of crossing the border by crawling on their hands and knees through an abandoned sewer line populated by hordes of rats. Things seem to be bright, however, when they arrive in Los Angeles. He becomes a busboy in an upscale restaurant, she finds work as a maid in Beverly Hills, and both try to learn English in their free time. They soon find, however, that life in the U.S. is not all that it appears and their situation unravels when Enrique is reported to INS officials by a jealous employee. El Norte wears its heart on its sleeve and the film tends toward the melodramatic, but it faithfully mirrors the fear and uncertainty that illegal immigrants face each day and I can forgive its flaws and applaud the loving bond between brother and sister and the strength it produces in their lives.

I first saw this movie in 1989 or so and, being in high school and rather naive at the time, was blown away by unromantic portrayal of the lives of two Guatemalan refugees living as illegal immigrants in California. I still find it a moving film.

Siblings Arturo and Rosa flee their mountain village after their father is killed and trek across Mexico with dreams of living in the United States -- "El Norte." The story is sprinkled with humor, but the overall theme is tragedy. The political overtones are forceful as well; the course of one's life depends more on where one was born than how resourceful one is. This idea is explored in the contrast between the situations faced by the refugees and those of Americans they encounter. Arturo's struggle to find work is perilous, and demands huge sacrifices.

Thankfully, the movie doesn't portray its subject simplistically. There are several sympathetic American characters and some unsympathetic non-Americans. However, the film is ultimately critical of America, simply because Americans have so much and give so little of it to their closest neighbours. More than that, Americans are woefully unaware of the circumstances that many of those living within their country face. El Norte is an important film because it has the ability to change this.

Fifteen years ago, the indigenous people in Guatemala, were living a cruel extermination that forced them to flee toward Mexico and the United States. This exodus lasted a decade and half a million Guatemalans made the journey to America seeking for asylum and refuge.

In that time, a young Chicano film maker, full of noble idealism,honesty,and with no more resources but his immense talent to tell stories, put his eyes in this tragedy and made the most beautiful epic poem ever filmed about our indigenous nations: El Norte, a picture that gave voice to those that don´t have it.

With El Norte, the spectators of that time, became aware, in slambang, of a reality that have been communicated to them mostly through the press, but wich they had never confronted in such hard and frontal manner.

And in some way, El Norte became a powerfull fighting element. Grew an audience, searched audiences, left the theatres to tell its truth. Got into the schools, universities, into film festivals, and in every forum that wanted to hear it, and it´s message was founding echo in the spectators identifyed with the story of the lost paradise of all the poor of the world in which, Rosa and Enrique represent millions of young people of any color and continent, starving for security and freedom, those that every day start the search of the lost paradise through hell.

Fifteen years had gone by since the time we made this film, and unfortunately, the story that has been told in El Norte, will have to be told for a long time. We, the latinamericans, are in deep debt with Anna Thomas and Gregory Nava. Thank you for making, from this tragedy a masterpice.

Some say that a poem never won a workers strike; this may be true, but it is also true that some poems had helped us to keep the faith, and as long as you have faith, you have not been defeated.

And if you don´t belive me, ask via internet to subcomandante Marcos, who has been fighting five years in Chiapas, México, for the indigenous rigths, with no weapon other than his word. And by the way, in many of the towns El Norte was filmed. We thank the people who are helping preserve today our story in order to be shown to the future generations.

I saw El Norte (The North) some years ago when my then girlfriend (whose father was from Mexico) rented the video and made me watch it. I'm glad she did. It covers the very basic quest story of a brother and a sister who flee Guatemala (where the indigenous population was being exterminated) through Mexico to try and find a new life in the US. Along the way they encounter all the setbacks you would imagine, including a few you don't expect. This is a serious and dramatic film that is also not afraid to find the humor that can still occur in the midst of deep struggle.

I understand that this movie was made on a shoestring and at times it shows. But the story and the acting more than carry the day. Its creative team (Gregory Nava and his wife Anna Thomas) are also responsible for the movies Selena and Mi Familia (among others), both excellent films. I think that the real history of most people living on the earth, who live ordinary lives and struggle against sometimes oppressive forces outside their control, has largely gone unwritten. In its own small way, this movie begins to make up the deficit.

Excellent--highly recommended

Having taught illegal immigrants for decades, this movie intrigued me. From what I have been told by the parents of my students, this movie correctly depicts the lives of many of people who struggle to get to this country. I also know from working with older students, that the life shown in the movie in Southern California is also accurate.

When I taught college sociology classes, I made this movie mandatory viewing (along with "Emerald Forest" and "Belzaire the Cajun." Don't expect a 'feel-good' movie--it's not this one. Do expect to get a glimpse into the lives of millions of people who now live in the United States, and what it took to get here.

PS--Much of this movie is in the Spanish and South American Indian language (with subtitles). Block out the bottom of the screen if you want to practice your español. ¡Qué bueno! (Si, yo hablo español.)