the filmmaker Rudy Valdez premiered his documentary translatorfocused on the responsibilities of immigrant children Help her parents communicate in the United States. With a look at reality, the director wanted to visualize the different situations that Latino families experience in the North American country, where they often do not speak English and need great support to carry out basic activities.
More than 11 million children in the United States act as translators for their families on important matters. according to information that Valdez himself revealed to Al día. That’s why he wanted to focus on this theme for his next audiovisual project, which premiered at the Los Angeles Latino International Film Festival and will be screened at the Tribeca Film Festival in New York later this month.
Rudy Valdez, the creator of TranslatorsCNN
in the movie The daily life of three Latino families living in the USA is shown.: a Guatemalan, a Venezuelan and a Colombian. They all have one thing in common: Parents do not know English and it is their children who help them with important decisions or procedures. Harye, Densel and Virginia, the child protagonists, tell their experiences and their true stories.
“All children need their parents, but for Densel (11), Harye (13), Virginia (16) and the more than 11 million children in the United States who are the only English speakers in their families, that relationship sometimes changes. “This is the untold story of children who act as translators for their family on matters that are sometimes more mature than they are,” reads the documentary’s official website.
Although it was not easy to find those who wanted to take part in the short film, which is just over 20 minutes long, Valdez hopes the result sends a meaningful message. “I wish I could say it was easy, but no. We wanted to find families who felt comfortable and understood the purpose. These were very honest and vulnerable,” he told the above media outlet.
According to his story, what he finds most exciting about his career is conveying stories that the public can identify with: “Part of the beauty of this movie is that you see someone else go through it and realize it’s a lot more common.“.
The poster of the documentary film Translators
Beyond the desire to make this reality visible as it is a current problem in the US, The filmmaker did this project because it is a subject that he observed from a young age. Although he never worked as a translator for his parents, he observed other children doing it every day. Growing up in Lansing, Michigan, where her parents owned a grocery store and a Mexican restaurant, she witnessed this phenomenon occurring more often than previously thought.
“We were in the center of this small Mexican community in Lansing. It was a place where Spanish, English and Spanglish were freely spoken. It was the kind of place where people would meet every now and then,” he explained. Next to, He recalled how many people went to his parents’ institution and asked them for help with translations for carrying out various procedures: “And that was when I was young. That was my first impression of what equality means and what barriers there are for certain people with language difficulties.”
THE NATION