Trump’s hard line on immigration was an issue he campaigned on continually, turning undocumented immigrants into an ominous threat to the country’s stability. Barely in office, he has already had his Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem join officers as they carried out an immigration arrest in New York City on Tuesday, the latest effort to promote Trump’s nationwide crackdown on undocumented immigrants—or in his terms “illegal criminals.” In doing that, he has blurred the line between undocumented immigrants who have committed no crimes and those who have. Meanwhile, he pardoned the true criminals who took part in the violent January 6 attack on the Capitol.
A short, 15-minute fictional film nominated for an Academy Award, “A Lien” was directed by brothers David and Sam Cutler-Kreutz. It centers on a young couple confronting the oppressiveness of the immigration process. The couple, William Martinez (Oscar Gomez) and Victoria Ratermanis (Sophia Gomez), and their young daughter are at the immigration offices for William’s green card interview. The film economically constructs an emotionally charged narrative filed with anxiety and tension, as William is trapped in a bureaucratic process where what should be cut and dry is turned into pure dread. The storyline is based on the fact that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), viewed as the villain in “A Lien,” has a history of detaining and deporting undocumented individuals like William (whose longtime home is Queens) during green card appointments.
The film is shot with consummate skill, avoiding explicit messaging and allowing the action to speak for itself, with the intimate close-ups, long corridors, bare lighting, and editing of the characters’ chaotic movements capturing the intense stress that permeates the situation in which they find themselves. A repressive ICE acts towards William in a chilling manner, as if it is the police force of an authoritarian regime. Obviously, not a big leap in Trump’s America.
“A Lien” is a film that leaves you angry and aware that, with Trump in office, U.S. immigration policy will only get more arbitrary, frightening, and inchoate.
