This film, made in 2009, is well thought out in every way. Wayne Kramer, director/writer/co-producer, hailing from South Africa, must have felt the same difficulties crossing US territory and obtaining legality when he so delicately highlights the worry-filled and devastating process of gaining status. once one enters the land of dreams.
Before exploring the plot of the Crossing Over movie, I would like to mention my own impression of its technical features. First of all, the film benefits from a remarkably rich cast headed by Harrison Ford (as Max Brogan) and others like Ashley Judd (as Denise Frankel) and Ray Liotta (Cole Frankel) who perfectly convey every ripple of emotion within each character. , caused by living conditions, to the audience.
However, there seems to be shortcomings in terms of cultural or behavioral study of ethnic families, as there are conflicting instances, for example, the Iranian family that came to America a long time ago despite the fact that the head of the family is depicted as Pro-Islamic revolution and follower of Khomeini. Despite the associations of a religious person, this man serves his guests liquor. Strange. Also, the outfits don’t match people with those profiles. It is not known if it is due to the director’s ignorance or the fact that families like this one, to a certain extent, try to adapt to American life. On the other hand, Kramer comes so close to putting Iranian culture in the electric chair when he almost, wrongly, says that this is what awaits Iranian girls who share similar circumstances to Zahra Baraheri: victims of honor killings. . But thank God at the end of the film the director removes the confusion by showing that this case was a mere mental condition of an older brother.
Second, the camera angle and movements are flawless and handled so professionally that the shots clearly draw the audience into the film and make them feel the same as the characters, or in some cases see their thoughts.
The setting, in keeping with the nature of the plot, is brilliantly chosen; A very attractive and cosmopolitan Los Angeles that is made up of different ethnicities and attracts many immigrants.
The film’s plot revolves around the hot and controversial topic of immigration and the horrific stages people must go through in order to share the American Dream and enjoy the “promised opportunities.”
Some of the characters depicted in this film reveal a paradox about who they are and what they have to do to earn a living, or mainly in this case, to gain legality and obtain a green card:
Max Brogan (Harrison Ford), who is shown, in his first scene in this film, as an affectionate, soft and sensitive “human”, works as an ICE agent, who is constantly mocked by his colleagues for his supposed sweetness. . The truth is, this type of work requires a stone-cold heart in regards to what they face every day. Ford’s character is a lonely old man who catches illegal immigrants during sudden raids on workplaces, like Andasol Fabrics, then deports them and finally runs after them trying to make things right.
Hamid Baraheri (Cliff Curtis), is Brogan’s co-worker who deports minorities while himself coming from one of them. Another conflicting situation about this character is that he describes his culture as that in Iranian families it is important to make the father proud, but did they do it? Is the father proud when his daughter is dead?
Future rock musician Gavin Kossef (Jim Sturgess) is a Jewish self-declared atheist, though, when necessary, he doesn’t hesitate to use his “Jewish Card” to get an American green card by trying to convince clergymen that he is a Hebrew scholar as well as a preacher.
Claire Shepard (Alice Eve), Gavin’s Australian girlfriend, who has come to the United States to pursue her dream of becoming an actress, but lacks the status to act on the TV show she’s already been on. Eve’s character faces grave disgrace and deportation when authorities discover that she has been sharing a bed with an INS official in order to obtain her green card.
Cole Frankel (Ray Liotta) is the INS officer who is married to an immigration lawyer, one trying to reduce the number of immigrants and the other fighting to defend their rights and lead them to citizenship.
Denise Frankel (Ashley Judd), Cole Frankel’s wife, an immigration attorney who is doing everything she can to help people. The touching trait of this character is her descent from the African continent. Most likely, it is to show how much she feels for the little Nigerian girl, that she desperately waits for her parents to come and get her out of the penitentiary where she has been confined for so long.
Zahra Baraheri (Melody Khazai) is the only American member of the Iranian family. Born and raised. She is the little sister of Hamid Baraheri. The problem of this character has to do with her way of life, which is considered shameful for the whole family.
Taslima (Summer Bishil), a fifteen-year-old Bengali high school student, who gets into trouble for making a speech which results in her being accused of “invoking sympathy for the 9/11 hijackers”. Although she advocates for free speech, while she is inspected by an FBI agent, she is deported anyway. On her assignment paper he had written: “Their voices of hers were heard. You may not like what they had to say or how they conveyed her message, but for the first time we heard it.”
Mireya Sánchez (Alice Braga), an illegal immigrant who arrives in Los Angeles to work from Mexico across the border with the United States. When Max Brogan catches her, she mentions her child and begs the agent to take care of her. Later, she is killed at the US border trying to return for her young son.
Yong Kim (Justin Chon), who is the eldest of a Korean family whose father brought them to the United States so they could have a better future. He joins a Korean gang that later gets involved in an armed robbery. His friends are killed by agent Hamid Beraheri, who lets Yong escape.
There have been some comments about the plot of this movie blaming it for its artificial flow of coincidences that unite all the characters. However, I think everyone in their life has had one or two of these kinds of experiences; run into an old friend through a chain of acquaintances, for example. Small world!
