Mixed Feelings: San Diego/Tijuana

Phantoms of the Sierra Madre(en)

A Danish writer travels to Mexico with the purpose of locating a mysterious Apache tribe that fervently seeks to remain in obscurity.

Reginald D. Hunter's Songs of the Border(en)

Against the backdrop of President Trump's much-trumpeted wall, Reginald D. Hunter takes a 2,000-mile road trip along the US-Mexico border to explore how romance and reality play out musically where third-world Mexico meets first-world USA on this broken road to the American dream. Classic American pop and country portray Mexico as a land of escape and romance, but also of danger; Hunter explores the border music as it is today, much of it created by musicians drawn from the 36 million Mexican-Americans who are US citizens.

Borderland Blues(en)

„The Frontier“ or „La Frontera“ is the undulating landscape of the Sonora Desert in Arizona, which once was a symbol of freedom on the horizon of the American West – and also a region plagued by recurrent territorial struggles. Currently, a high steel fence stretches over several miles strictly separating the USA and Mexico into two territories. Every year, the remains of hundreds of migrants are retrieved from the area. The tense situation in Arizona’s borderland has split the locals into two groups: one demanding a more technically advanced border control system, the other requesting more humanitarian help. Accompanying various locals, NGO workers and self-proclaimed border guards from the region, filmmaker Gudrun Gruber raises the question of whether the latest border control technology will finally bring peace to the area, or rather merely increase the number of deaths.

Borderland(en)

A powerful set of stories of “righteous persons” taking action along the U.S.-Mexico border, motivated by moral conviction and compassion. "Borderland" shows how courageous actions can lead to political mobilization and the defense of human rights in the face of hate and discrimination.

ALTAR: Cruzando Fronteras, Building Bridges(it)

Examines the life, work, and cultural significance of Gloria Anzaldúa, poet and visual artist, and those she inspired in women's Chicano art. The work highlights the struggle for women's and gay rights.

Through the Repellent Fence: A Land Art Film(en)

The film follows Postcommodity, an interdisciplinary arts collective comprised of Raven Chacon, Cristóbal Martinez and Kade L. Twist, who put land art in a tribal context. The group bring together a community to construct the Repellent Fence, a two-mile long ephemeral monument “stitching” together the US and Mexico.

Walls of Silence(ko)

Mexico─United States border bar, “Trump Wall” is full of displaced migrants’ grief. Gaston who came to America as a teenager, is expelled from the States at his 40s and meets his family at the Wall. Bassam and Rami, becomes a dad who lost their daughter by each other. This film describes the people who lost their family by the wall and includes the views of refugees, human rights. Actor Jung Woo Sung participated in narration of the film.

American Ocelot(en)

American Ocelot tells the story of one of the most endangered and beautiful wild cats in the United States — a species so elusive that high-quality images and video have never been captured until now. With fewer than 100 individuals remaining in the US, the ocelot is critically endangered, genetically isolated, and only exists in Texas.

Which Way Home(en)

Follows unaccompanied child migrants, on their journey through Mexico, as they try to reach the United States.

Salidas y Entradas | Exits and Entrances(en)

For the three-channel video Salidas y Entradas Exits and Entrances, artists Jessica Hankey and Erin Johnson worked with applied theatre facilitator Gina Sandi Diaz to offer performance workshops at public daytime senior centers managed by the city of El Paso’s Parks and Recreation Department. With the senior center as a stage, the elders who participated in the workshops enacted social, political and geographical imaginaries for the camera. Through improvisation and performance exercises drawn from the work of Viola Spolin and Augusto Boal, themes emerge: the dynamics of the U.S.- Mexico border, the desire to be seen, the role of musical storytelling as a soundtrack to daily life, power dynamics, and gender as performance. As the boundaries between rehearsal, improvisation, and performance blur, the ways in which individual lives and sociopolitical realities merge together are foregrounded.

El Otro Lado(es)

Mr. Trump, Pardon the Interruption(es)

An analysis of the impact on the United States Latino community of immigration policies promoted by President Donald Trump.

Borderlands(en)

With shared economic, environmental, and humanitarian concerns, communities of local planners, designers, and citizens work toward cross-border collaboration. Ronald Rael, an architecture professor, takes an opportunity to use art to prove the uselessness of building borders.

Refuge(e)(en)

Refuge(e) traces the incredible journey of two refugees, Alpha and Zeferino. Each fled violent threats to their lives in their home countries and presented themselves at the US border asking for political asylum, only to be incarcerated in a for-profit prison for months on end without having committed any crime. Thousands more like them can't tell their stories.

Amexica: Life in the Borderlands(fr)

A road trip, over ten years, across the so-called Amexican border, a mythical boundary, both physical and cultural, that separates the United States of America from the United Mexican States; a journey in search of the multiple stories of those who inhabit it or are passing through: an audacious expedition that aims to paint a colorful fresco where politics, violence, visual poetry and frustrated ambitions cruelly coexist.

On the Road with Mary(fr)

Why don't we do something to ease the suffering of the poor, the excluded? Because we live in fear of "the other," the stranger. Filmed a few months before the 2004 presidential election, On the Road with Mary is a gripping view of an America living in fear. From a miserable neighbourhood in Detroit ravaged by crack and violence, to the militarized border with Mexico, this potent road movie exposes the unbearable other side of the American Dream.

Someday It Will Fall(en)

From the mouth of the Rio Grande to the beaches of Tijuana, two girls play on separate ends of the U.S. Mexico border thousands of miles apart.

Birth on the border(es)

One million people legally cross the U.S.-Mexico border every day in both directions. Among them are women from Ciudad Juárez who cross to give birth in El Paso, Texas. Even with visas that allow them to cross, their journeys are uncertain. Gaby and Luisa, two women from Ciudad Juárez, cross legally into El Paso, Texas, in order to give birth. Two Chicana midwives in El Paso, Lina and Sandra, support the women who cross. After living through the extreme violence that engulfed Ciudad Juárez from 2008-2012 and with the looming threat of obstetrical violence in Mexican hospitals, Gaby and Luisa choose to cross, seeking a safer future for their children and the opportunity for natural childbirth with midwives. They risk losing their visas, getting turned back, and harassment at the hands of U.S. Border Patrol. Against the backdrop of oppressive U.S. border policy, these women's stories of risk and resilience reveal the complexities of life on the U.S.-Mexico border.

El Mariachi(es)

El Mariachi just wants to play his guitar and carry on the family tradition. Unfortunately, the town he tries to find work in has another visitor, a killer who carries his guns in a guitar case. The drug lord and his henchmen mistake el Mariachi for the killer, Azul, and chase him around town trying to kill him and get his guitar case.

Radical(es)

In a Mexican border town plagued by neglect, corruption, and violence, a frustrated teacher tries an unorthodox new method to break through his students’ apathy and unlock their curiosity, their potential... and perhaps even their genius.