‘Separated’ Review: Errol Morris Hasn’t Forgotten Trump’s Immigration Policy Cruelty and Neither Should We | Chicago International Film Festival

It’s tough for feature-length documentaries to always be on the cutting edge of topicality. The very nature of film production means that most documentaries will take at least a full year from pre-production to when it finally reaches an audience. Indeed, the Best Documentary Short category at the Oscars is often a much better array of immediately topical films than those found in Best Documentary Feature. Separated, the new film from previous winner of the latter category Errol Morris (The Fog of War), covers a subject that dominated the news cycle about six years ago – the Trump administration’s inhumane immigration policy which forcibly separated migrant parents from their children upon crossing the southern border. It would’ve been easy to rush the film to have it ready before the 2020 election, in hopes of affecting that race. Instead, Morris clearly took his time, using NBC News correspondent Jacob Soboroff’s book Separated: Inside an American Tragedy as a jumping-off point. This documentary uses carefully curated interviews to gather together a timeline-based assessment of Trump’s racist strategy, which effectively shows how it was put in place and executed. And most importantly of all, it sounds a warning about the possibility of a similar policy being implemented again in the future.

Morris’s approach to the interviews is consistently effective at drawing good answers out of his subjects. In fact, he’s not afraid to let his voice be heard as he pushes them for clarification or expresses disbelief at some of the more upsetting claims. This should come as no surprise to anyone who’s seen The Fog of War or his acclaimed documentary The Thin Blue Line. It’s typical of Morris to delve into his subjects with a probing, detailed technique. With Separated, he smartly doesn’t include interviews from a large number of people, choosing instead to use only a handful of interviewees. This helps the audience to become acquainted with each of them and to easily keep track of who they are and what their roles in this story are. 

They all make for fascinating subjects, but one of them stands out. Captain Jonathan White served as Deputy Director for the Office of Refugee Resettlement, meaning he was right in the thick of it when the separation policy was implemented. White is an incredible interviewee, giving impassioned answers that never sacrifice facts for the sake of emotional impact. He speaks in no uncertain terms about the effect this policy has had on those most vulnerable, calling out the governmental perpetrators by name and labeling them for what they are – child abusers. Morris subtly centers the film around him, and it’s clear why. If this were a narrative film, he’d undoubtedly be the main character. White manages to cut through the bureaucratic explanations offered by some of the other interview subjects and get right to the heart of the matter; namely that this practice was inhumane, unconstitutional, and a stain on the moral fabric of a nation that purports to be the greatest in the world. That greatness is often defined by those in power by our might or our militaristic strength, while White shows that true American greatness comes from those willing to stand up for what’s right in the face of intense, well-protected opposition. 

While Morris assembles a fantastic series of talking heads, his film flounders when it deviates from this format. He intersperses scenes between the interviews which depict the journey of a migrant mother-son pair as they journey to the border and are ultimately separated. These stand-in characters are portrayed by actors Gabriela Cartol and Diego Armando Lara Lagunes. Both do an admirable job at showing the plight and pain of a typical migrant experience during the time of the separation policy. But the very concept and execution of these scenes can’t help but feel unnecessary at best, manipulative at worst. While it’s understandable that Morris would want to put a face – even a fictionalized one – to the many anonymous and unknown stories of those separated at the border, it doesn’t feel entirely needed. In fact, no part of these recreations are as effective as the brief news footage we see of the very real migrant children locked in cages as journalists dutifully shuffle past. It’s the kind of chilling historical moment that feels destined to be shown in classrooms for the rest of our nation’s time.

Separated is an alarming, upsetting, and stirring look at one of the darkest chapters in American history. It demands to be seen, not just to pay tribute to those hurt by this policy, but to remind audiences that it very well could happen again. The film makes a point to stress that even after all the hard work of those who reunited as many as they could, some children remain apart from their families. As White says, “[These children are] not a metaphor. Each of them is an actual child, and a child in terrible danger.” American policy can often feel abstract in its ramifications. With Separated, Errol Morris forces viewers to think of each child forcibly-orphaned by the state as the very real victim of fascistic, hateful thinking horribly transformed from campaign talking point to brutal mandate.

Grade: B+

Separated is an MSNBC Films, Submarine Deluxe and Greenwich Entertainment release. The film received an Oscar-qualifying weeklong release on October 4 and will be released theatrically by Submarine Deluxe and broadcast on MSNBC December 7.