The Los Angeles Independent Film Festival, which runs From September 20th – the 28th has a great line up of films lined up for the public’s viewing. One of those films is El Norte.
El Norte is an epic film of historic proportions in depicting the immigrant story of a brother and sister. Written by Anna Thomas and Gregory Nava, who also directs, El Norte was released in 1983 and now could be considered as the foretelling the current immigration dilemma — the human element of the story you rarely hear about.
El Norte is the only film written and directed by a Chicano filmmaker to have received an Oscar nomination for Best Orignal Screenplay. In 1995 El Norte was also selected for preservation in the U.S. National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being culturally, historically or aesthetically significant
In 2015 Matthew Holtmeier wrote in his film essay entitled simply El Norte (2015) about the importance of this indie film El Norte.
The film follows two indigenous Maya siblings, Rosa and Enrique, who are forced to flee their village during the Guatemalan Civil War to avoid ethnic and political persecution. After an arduous trek through Mexico, they face horrific conditions to cross the border into the United States. When they finally reach Los Angeles, immigration raids and employment troubles overwhelm their new life. Unable to live freely or return to their home in Guatemala, Rosa and Enrique find themselves caught in the margins.
Director Nava tells a heartbreaking story that mixes magical and social realism. El Norte endures as a painfully relevant story about the realities of undocumented immigrants in the United States and their harrowing journeys to seek out a better life.
A Q&A with Nava will immediately follow this screening, schedule permitting.
El Norte (1983) was restored in 2017 by the Academy Film Archive, supported in part by the Getty Foundation.
El Norte (1983) was restored in 2017 by the Academy Film Archive, supported in part by the Getty Foundation.
Cast: Zaide Silvia Gutierrez, David Villalpando, Lupe Ontiveros, Ernesto Gomez Cruz, Alicia del Lago, Trinidad Silva, Enrique Castillo, and Mike Gomez.
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