Lagan Sebert & Sandra Sampayo
(BUSCO PERSONAS – THE STORY OF A DISPLACED GENERATION)

BUSCO PERSONAS – THE STORY OF A DISPLACED GENERATION shows us just that - the faces of the people in Colombia. Many of those faces speak a thousand words before they even have a chance to utter their first for the camera. These are people that have been forced to leave their homes, displaced by guerilla fighters; people who have lost limbs to mines placed in their villages; and people that have lost some, if not all, of their family members as collateral damage to the nation’s drug war.

Is that news to you? Lagan Sebert and Sandra Sampayo are guessing that it is. Because, despite the voices of the local people crying out for help and aid and despite the best efforts of some music artists coming out of that country, Colombia is a nation actively choking and killing off its own population seemingly invisible to the world’s eyes. Their documentary short makes the smart choice to let the people speak for themselves, sometimes without the need of anyone actually speaking.

BUSCO PERSONAS
screens as part of SHORTS PROGRAM THREE
7:15 p.m. Tuesday, November 4 @ ArcLight 13
1:00 p.m. Wednesday, November 5 @ ArcLight 10
Lagan Sebert and Sandra Sampayo will be attending both screenings and will participate in a Q&A afterward.

Why do you believe the world hasn’t trained its attention to what is going on in Colombia to the same extent that it does in the Sudan?

Lagan:  The images of Sudan’s sprawling refugee camps isolated in the midst of barren desert are some of the most arresting of our time.  Sudan’s crisis has touched the heartstrings of millions in part because the brutal reality is there for everyone to see.  In Colombia the displaced are not gathered together in refugee camps—they are hidden along riverbeds, in the ghettos of the cities, and on the desolate street corners of Colombia.  Even though there are millions, Colombia’s displaced have to be found, and that’s why we decided to call the film BUSCO PERSONAS (LOOKING FOR PEOPLE).

Sandra:  The crisis in Sudan has been forced in front of people’s faces for much longer than Colombia’s.  Even though Colombia’s displacement crisis has been relatively ignored by the main-stream media, awareness has to start somewhere.  Many in the U.S. have a perception of Colombians as drug runners and criminals.  Many believe those displaced have somehow done something to deserve it.  But the reality is that most displaced people in Colombia are innocent victims of a war they had no part in.  They are the casualties of a war that is funded by and based on drug consumption in the United States.

How difficult was it to get people to speak and how – ultimately - did you get them to trust you enough to agree to be interviewed on camera?

Lagan:  That was all Sandra.  I speak Spanish, but I’m way too white to have been able to do this project on my own.

Sandra: Depending on the area, some people definitely did not want to speak, especially in the indigenous communities. It was important for me to have people understand that I grew up in a town at the center of Colombia’s war. I was born in Barrancabermeja, which has been unstable and violent my entire life. My father and my family still live there and the violence, poverty and displacement are part of their reality. By sharing my background people understood that we were going to be sensitive about their situation, and that their story could have easily been my own.

Why do you feel musicians like Juanes and ChocQuibTown have a real opportunity to make a difference in this struggle?

Lagan: Going back to why Sudan has become such a huge human rights issue—It might have something to do with Bono, Angelina Jolie, Brad Pitt, George Clooney, Nicole Kidman, and Don Cheadle—all of whom have been involved with issues in Sudan. The reality is that star power makes a difference in our pop-culture obsessed society.

Sandra: These artists can reach audiences that may not necessarily pay attention to the subject in and outside of Colombia. The message that each of these musicians has is both entertaining and thought provoking and is a reminder to the world that, as ChocQuibTown say “ Colombia isn’t only cocaine, marijuana, and coffee.”

What was the biggest surprise over the course of making the film?

Lagan: To be honest—the fact that people really wanted to see it and that people have been excited about the film. This was one of my first experiences filming and editing—the entire time I assumed I was doing everything wrong—and though there are definitely technical things we could have done better, the fact that we accomplished what we set out to do was probably the biggest surprise.

Sandra:  How much we learned in the process and how deeply involved we became in giving the internally displaced people a voice.  Filming in some areas, we actually feared for our lives at times, but we always felt the risk was justified.  I had never really felt that in my own country.  I also want to make it clear that there are only certain places in Colombia that actually feel this tension day today.

Did you have any thought to attempt to get anyone from the FARC or the Black Eagles or any of the other groups terrorizing the villages in Colombia to speak on camera?

Lagan and Sandra:  One of the points we wanted to make in this piece is that the FARC and the all of the Paramilitary groups do not deserve a voice.  They are murderers and drug runners.  The FARC may have stood for a legitimate social ideology at one time, but they have been corrupted by the drug trade long ago.  The last thing we wanted to do was to justify any of their behavior.  In our opinion, the FARC have enjoyed too much support from enclaves of progressive social thinkers for too long—they have branded themselves as socialists fighting for the rural poor when in practice they murder rural Colombians and steal their land.  The Black Eagles are even more horrendous.

You both have worked as staff at AFI FEST (Sebert as Publicity Coordinator and Sampayo as a Theater Manager). What are you most looking forward to in returning as filmmakers?

Lagan:  Not having to work!!!!!  I don’t have to worry about anything except for what movie I want to watch or what flavor cocktail to have.

Sandra:  As an ex-theater manager I will enjoy actually going in and seeing the movies instead of just catching the first and last 5 minutes.  I always envied those people that had nothing to do except come in, eat their popcorn, and enjoy the show.  I am also looking forward to seeing our little documentary on a big giant screen…

Do you see yourselves returning to Colombia to continue to explore the issues you touched on with BUSCO PERSONAS or to follow up on some of the people you filmed and got to know?

Lagan: Our film provides a window into the reality of the displacement crisis in Colombia, but the picture is much larger.  I would love to reconnect with some of the people we spoke with and work closer with some of the organizations such as Fusion International and Fundacion Mi Sangre to look deeper into how to improve the situation on a grander scale.

But there are also many different stories in Colombia that I would love to tell.  Colombia to me remains a bit surreal—the reality is not that much different from magical descriptions written down by Gabriel Garcia Marquez in his many novels.  It is at once beautiful, extreme, passionate, friendly and at times dangerous—it’s a perfect place to document things.

Sandra: I would absolutely love to continue working with the displacement issue in Colombia—especially if it will increase awareness.  On the other hand, I would also enjoy telling a story that doesn’t focus on violence or drugs.  I would love to tell a story about Colombia’s history and possibly include the story of my own family and the things they lived through. I am extremely patriotic and proud of where I came from and I want to show people all the different sides of Colombia and its people.