A sparse crowd braved the impending arrival of Hurricane Helene last Thursday night to take in “Bulls and Saints,” the first of six scheduled Southern Circuit Tour of Independent Filmmakers screenings scheduled at The Plaza Arts Center over the next few months.
Chilean filmmaker Rodrigo Dorfman was on hand, too, providing a little background before the film started and then taking questions from a small but interested audience once it ended.
He explained that the film took seven years from start to final cut, and his original finished version was 72 minutes long. However, due to the demands of a one-hour television slot, the version shown at The Plaza and on TV’s Public Broadcasting Service was just 52 minutes.
“My thoughts on time have changed,” Dorfman admitted. “I've been thinking about time much more. So, I’m glad you could see that was the biggest challenge.”
In a tale of reverse migration, “Bulls and Saints” follows an undocumented family from Central Mexico that’s lived in North Carolina for nearly 20 years but now wishes to build a house in Mexico and return to familiar, comforting confines. Shot entirely in Spanish with English subtitles, Dorfman explained that was a necessity, not a choice.
“[English] was literally still a foreign language. Even after years of being in North Carolina,” Dorfman said.
He also mentioned the irony of so many U.S.-born Americans resenting the presence of undocumented immigrants arriving in the States, while many of those who come get trapped here by a rigid and arcane immigration system that actively works to prevent them from returning home – even when they want to.
“This is what many migrants call the U.S., they call it ‘The Golden Cage.’ There is even a song about it,” he said.
He explained if a migrant’s parent dies in his homeland, it can take five or six months just to receive authorization to go to the burial. And then, if they do leave the country, depending on their immigration status, they may not be permitted to return to their family stateside.
“So, you have the parents who are here but cannot go bury their parents. And then some children may have been born here so they can go, but they’ve never been before, or it was when they were two or three years old. I mean, the level of storytelling is quite extraordinary, very intense,” Dorfman said.
Dorfman said he also started on “Bulls and Saints, Part II,” which features the American-born teenage son introduced but lightly featured in the first installment, along with his uncle as they head to Mexico to find fame and fortune on the bull-riding circuit there.
“The American dream does travel. And I think that's maybe another way to say, hey, this American dream is generous; it’s for sharing, and that doesn’t mean it has to happen here,” Dorfman said. “That’s what Kennedy wanted to do in the ‘60s, to take this prosperity into the Americas. That’s what many of the presidents have tried to do, which is to have some stability there so that people don’t have to, don’t want to, rip themselves apart and abandon their ancestors. That’s always the number one priority – but it happens. And so, the children are stuck between worlds.”
The next Southern Circuit Tour showing is scheduled for Oct. 22. It will feature “LIFT,” which examines “the invisible story of homelessness in America through the eyes of a group of young homeless and home-insecure ballet dancers in New York City.” Admission is free.
The filmmaker will give a pre-show presentation at 6 p.m., and the movie showings will begin an hour later.