Award of Merit – “The Wetback” (USA)

Title: The Wetback
Runtime: 16 min
Country: USA
Director: A.P. Gonzalez
Placement: Award of Merit
Competition: March 31, 2018

Synopsis: Ten year-old Danny and his friends find a body while playing near the L.A. River.  An older woman, the neighborhood’s eccentric, eventually claims the body believing it to be her long-lost love.  Danny’s grandfather and mother must take the body back and give it a proper burial, realizing that the authorities don’t really care about another illegal immigrant, another wetback.  In the process, a generation-long secret is revealed in this tale of “magical realism.”