The films we were shown in class were both touching stories of human struggle and success. They are stories that happen, quietly, everyday, yet which we often don’t think of. To many, the face of illegal immigration is often a stereotypical and one-dimensional story. Films like these importantly illustrate a few of the hundreds of individual possibilities that are the impetus for immigration and the cause for illegal immigration.

Illegal immigration is, at least in my experience, often glossed over and generalized. The right wing, and to a certain extent, most of the media has vilified the ‘illegal alien’, blaming the mass of unidentified workers who drive the agricultural and ‘menial’ job sectors for America’s economic struggles, painting a picture of a dirty and unlawful worker stealing American jobs. However, what should be the heart of the matter, and what these movies touch upon, is that these people are real people. They have hopes and dreams just like American citizens do. They love and live just like American citizens do, and they’re trying to feed their families and get through life just like American citizens are. Each of the men on the golden venture or of Cambodian origin had children, family and friends that were all heavily affected by their struggles with immigration. In sentenced home, emphasis was placed on the fact that this indeed was a sentence for these men. Even if some of the men were able to achieve a small measure of success, such as being able to build a small house, they still struggled with the reality of complete and nearly permanent separation from their families. For men like Kim Ho Ma, the sentence was complete: he had no job experience or prospects, no knowledge of the country he was sent to, and felt hopeless at being sent to a ‘home’ that was not at all his home. The film did an excellent job bringing forward the sadness, the anger, and the fear that these people have to deal with. It makes the emotions palpable and human, and lets us see what the hardships these people have to deal with really are like. The film was very real; nothing was sugarcoated, and it was an eye-opener for those who never think of the struggles people who are trying to make it in this country go through.

To me, these movies highlight the inability of the bureaucracy to deal with individuals. ICE and the INS have come to be known as ruthless and terrifying, because these undocumented immigrants know that they will be treated as a number and not as an individual. The constant fear that the Cambodian men lived under does not paint a flattering picture of the government agencies that are supposed to regulate immigration. They’re incomprehensive and one could go as far as to say, inhuman. The necessity and sheer numbers are understandable, but there is no doubt that there is a need for reform. Movies like these are important to bring attention to the flaws in the system that treats human beings so unfairly.