This story is part of True/False Conversations, a series of in-depth interviews with the filmmakers of this year’s True/False Film Fest. Find the rest of them here.
The idea of an American dream is shiny, polished with ideas of peace and Miami’s white beaches. But has this idea become tainted? Enrique Pedraza Botero sat down with KBIA’s Cristal Sanchez to discuss this glamorized dream through his own experiences as a Colombian immigrant who grew up in Miami. Botero’s film "No Se Ve Desde Aca" screens this weekend at the True False Film Fest.
Here’s the conversation:
Enrique Pedraza Botero: I was always sort of starked by the contrast in that city, that you could have $4 million condos on one side and then people who were arriving in buses and trying to get housing for a night on the other side of the street. I couldn’t sort of grasp in my head how that could happen, and I found this idea of our obsession with capital and capitalism as a way that the government allowed for a lot of those differences to kind of coexist in the same place. And so people that could invest a million dollar condo in the city could automatically get a green card versus people who have to wait in asylum for years before seeing any movement.
Cristal Sanchez: What do you want the audience to take away from that contrast?
Botero: The reality is that in a lot of countries, including mine, displacement is higher than ever, right? Like there is no "peace" that spread in the news. The armed conflict is still going on and people are still fleeing the country, not because they want to, but it's just because they have to. And in the film, you sort of see a little bit of those stories, but also the community that is formed around the immigrant community and the volunteer work, and I really wanted to, you know, not only be around them, but see how they make it work. I mean, it's as simple as offering food to people, you know, that kind of go by the city every day and are trying to make a living for their families and. And so I wanted the film to kind of show that contrast and even people from the same country can have completely different experiences.
Sanchez: You mention the collapse of the American dream. That’s a really prominent theme in your film. Why is it important to portray this theme? Because the film took place before the election.
Botero: We definitely have seen, you know, the journey, especially from the immigrant communities in the U.S., just get tougher by the day, you know, not only related to things like inflation and the cost of living right, in most part of the country, which is just unreasonable. But also a lot of issues of discrimination. I think that is part of the collapse of the American dream in my eyes, you know, I remember there were times where, and the film shows a little bit of this footage, but you know, in the 60s, in the 70s, in the 80s when people could come here and form their own community, and start their families in a way where they could blend within their community in ways that today feels almost impossible.
Although Botero’s short was filmed before the election, he invited audiences to reflect the implications the film has for marginalized communities under the current administration.
