Five Major Influences From Marco Williams

The Undocumented

The Undocumented

1. The Films of Frederick Wiseman When I set out to make The Undocumented the films of Fred Wiseman were my beacon; my inspiration. I wanted to make a film in the vein of his body of work—a direct cinema approach to the topic of immigration. I wanted to make a film that observed, rather than interrogated. I made a commitment to spend time in my location rather than parachute in for three or four days, interview principal characters, shoot some activity or event in which said characters were engaged, and some b-roll or better stated as footage. 

Although my film did not fully fulfill this aesthetic objective, almost all of the shooting that I did was done with this lens. 

2. Killer of Sheep by Charles Burnett Charles Burnett's Killer of Sheep is a film that I have embraced and celebrated since the early 1980s. Charles’ attention to the nuances of his characters—the neo-realism—was always on my mind while filming in the morgue and in the desert. My film does not have the humor that Killer of Sheep displays, but I tried hard to emulate the compassion displayed by his characters.

3. Regarding the Pain of Others, Susan Sontag Early in my production I made a commitment to film death in an unflinching, unvarnished fashion. I determined to present what I observed: the work of forensic pathologist, medical investigators and Border Patrol Agents. How to present death without alienating my audience? Sontag’s book gave me courage, doubt, but ultimately inspiration and confidence to take this approach to my film.

4. German Expressionist artist Käthe Kollwitz print cycles, War (Krieg) and Death (Tod)  I love this series. The images are stark. Käthe presents in her woodcarvings just enough of a face to express the trauma, the intensity and the humility available when confronting death. I sought and found this in all of my encounters with the Mexican families that I filmed when the body of a loved one returned home.

5. Special Flight, Fernand Melger I was a member of the jury at Full Frame in 2012 that gave this film the Anne Dellinger Grand Jury Award. After watching it, I sat quietly for a few minutes knowing that I had just watched a cinematic masterpiece. From the first scene to the last, I thought to myself: I want to make a film that invites people to discover through watching not by being told or having things explained.

“Director Fernand Melgar takes us deep inside the world of detained immigrants in Switzerland. With incredible access and patient observation, we experience the complex and powerful relationships between the captives and their captors. An exceptional work of vérité filmmaking.”