Written by Pablo Portilla del Valle
Photograph by Danielle McGotty
The movie “Cartel Land,” premiered on the first day of the Savannah Film Festival on Saturday, Oct. 24. It follows the struggle of the on-going drug wars in Mexico and the story of the ‘Autodefensas’ of Michoacán, a group of civilians who have decided to take matters into their own hands, waging armed conflict against the Mexican Cartel.
The writer and director of this raw and compelling film, Matthew Heineman, shared some of his experience in filming this adrenaline-high film-documentary.
“There were countless times were our lives were at risk filming this.” Heineman said. “But there’s hundredths of journalists around the world telling difficult stories in difficult places, so I don’t think anything I did was that unique or special. We were just trying to tell a story, like many people are.”
The movie sheds light on the group of armed civilians led by the physician Jose Mireles in Michoacán, who are fighting fire with fire against the Knights Templar drug Cartel.
The cameras behind “Cartel Land” take you close to some of the lives the drug wars have affected, even in the midst of shootings. When asked if there was ever a moment that seemed too dangerous to film, Heineman admitted “there were times” but even then, they always strived to record those moments.
“We tried to capture as much as we could to tell the reality of the story.”
Heineman explained that “Cartel Land” is not a policy film. That it does not seek to examine the board of immigration, or Mexican drug policies. It’s simply an experiential film “trying to take this issue out of the headlines and really humanize the effects of these drug wars on real people.”
“I didn’t set out to solve this issue or come up with any silver bullet, and the fact is, there’s obviously, clearly, not a silver bullet,” Heineman said.
“It’s basic economics, as long as there is a demand for drugs in the [United] States, there will be a supply of drugs coming from Mexico and South America, and until that stops the violence won’t stop.”
Heineman felt a “deep responsibility” to tell this story. He wanted to highlight there is a war happening in the country just south of the US, a war in which more than a hundred thousand people have been killed, and more than twenty thousand have disappeared.
“I fell in love with the place and the people. That’s what kept pushing me and pushing going down there, to try to understand what was happening.”
He stressed the importance of this conflict, and how it should be something we should be paying more attention to.
“Our neighbors, the country that we share so much history with, that we share a border with. We become obsessed with ISIS and all these conflicts around the world, but this is happening right here and we’re responsible for it, we’re connected to it, we’re funding this war through the consumption of drugs. ”
Before leaving, he shared some of his thoughts on the disappearance of the 43 young Mexican students in Mexico city. He expressed how news like these manifest “a lot of what we see in Cartel Land.”
“For me that is some of the things that I find hope in, is that this incident prompted huge outrage and hundreds of thousands of people marching the streets of Mexico City,” Heineman said. “I find hope that people are out there speaking out and hopefully that will lead to something.”
Cartel Land released on July 3, 2015 in theatres and is still circulating film festivals around the country. It can be bought or rented through Amazon Video and iTunes and The DVD is set to release sometime next year.
