Errol Morris examines migrant family separation with NBC News in ‘Separated’

VENICE, Italy — Filmmaker Errol Morris turned his lens toward the U.S. government’s border policies and family separation in the documentary “Separated,” which premiered at Thursday at the Venice Film Festival.

The Trump administration separated thousands of migrant parents from their children as it moved to criminally prosecute people for illegally crossing the Southwestern border. Minors, who could not be held in criminal custody with their parents, were transferred to the Department of Health and Human Services.

Facing strong opposition, Trump eventually reversed course in 2018, days before a federal judge in San Diego halted the practice and ordered immediate reunification in a lawsuit brought by the American Civil Liberties Union.

According to figures released by the Department of Homeland Security, 3,881 children were separated from their families from 2017 to 2021.

The film, which is not in competition at the festival, is based on journalist Jacob Soboroff’s book “Separated: Inside an American Tragedy.” Morris, the Oscar-winning documentarian behind the Robert S. McNamara film “The Fog of War,” made “Separated” in collaboration with NBC News Studios, Participant, Fourth Floor and Moxie Pictures.

Though focused on what transpired during the Trump administration, it begins with several voices of American presidents speaking about immigration.

“This is not just a problem of the Trump administration, though Trump escalated it to new levels of horror,” Morris said. “There has to be a better way.”

The film was intended it to be both an exploration of the “terrible misdeeds of our recent past” and a “cautionary tale for the future,” he wrote in a director’s statement.

Soboroff, a correspondent with NBC News, said that as a journalist he’s not “here to advocate for one particular policy decision or another.” Their hope, though, is for it to not happen again.

“Separated” includes a dramatic recreation of a family separation, brought to life by actors Gabriela Cartol and Diego Armando Lara Lagunes, as well as interviews with Elaine Duke, the former acting head of the Department of Homeland Security, an employee of the Office of Refugee Resettlement and whistleblower Jonathan White.

“We want people to be able to remember what happened and internalize the truth,” Soboroff said.

On his first day in office in 2021, President Joe Biden issued an executive order to reunite families that were split up. Two years later, the task force had reconnected nearly 700 children with their families; nearly 1,000 remained separated from their families.

The film, which runs only 93 minutes, does not yet have distribution. The moderator asked if they hoped that it might be acquired, and seen, before November’s U.S. presidential election.

“To me it’s essential that this comes out before the election,” Morris said. “I want this to come out before the election with the hope that it could make a difference.”

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