Of Memory and Debris

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A personal portrait of the director’s grandfather Opa, and his wife’s grandfather Ababo, who remained in Venezuela after most of their family emigrated due to the economic crisis and violence in the country.

Opa lives with his wife Oma, who has been suffering from Alzheimer’s for the past ten years, as he cares for her through her final days.

Ababo scrapes the sewers of his abandoned gold processing factory to accumulate gold remnants and afford a trip to Canada. His goal is to attend his granddaughter’s wedding.

An intimate character diptych, Of Memory And Debris tells the story of an unseen generation — the grandparents left behind by the largest exodus in Latin America’s recent history.

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Main credits

Michelangeli, Rodrigo (film director)
Michelangeli, Rodrigo (screenwriter)
Michelangeli, Rodrigo (film producer)
Thielen Armand, Jorge (film producer)
Aguirre, Daniela Maya (film producer)

Other credits

Editing, José Ostos.

MARC Record See Worldcat record

Keywords

Of Memories and Debris,De memoria y escombros,Rodrigo Michelangeli,Venezuela,Canada,documentary,short film,family,grandparents,exile,loneliness,health,healthy,physical health,mental health,emotional health,health equity,public health,health care,health policy,fitness,veracity,welfare,soundness,aging,age,old age,senior,youth,middle age,aging gracefully,advanced age,collective health,maturity,immigration,migration,refugee,exile,border,illegal,migrant,immigrant,undocumented,deportation,naturalization,visa,green card,permanent,resident,citizenship,displacement,diaspora,resettlement,family,kin,fellowship,household,immediate family,extended family,multigenerational family,multigenerational household,kinfolk,family tree,genealogy,nuclear family,modern family,family tree,migration studies,migrant studies,immigration studies,refugee studies,diaspora studies,resettlement studies,settlement studies,migration,migrant,immigration,refugee,diaspora,resettlement,settlement,refugees,international migration,continental migration,resettling,settlers,settler,migrant,migrant studies,first generation immigrant,first generation immigration,new americans,new spaniards,south america,south american countries,countries in south america,argentina,bolivia,brazil,chile,colombia,ecuador,guyana,paraguay,peru,suriname,uruguay,venezuela,south american politics,south american culture,south american cuisine,south american education,south america in media,south american languages,south america history,latin american studies,caribbean american studies,island studies,latin american culture,latin american history,latin american politics,caribbean american culture,caribbean american history,caribbean american politics, latin american languages,latin american and caribbean studies,hispanic american studies,hispanic people,hispanic culture,hispanic politics,short films,short film,short,non-feature,run time,short run time,running time,short running time,live-action short,documentary short,animated short,live-action short film,documentary short film,animated short film,economics,social class,money,capital,capitalism,class,economy,prejudice,intersectionality,inequality,poverty,income gap,wage gap,class warfare,elitism,snobbery,bourgeois,poverty,upper class,middle class,lower class,nouveau riche; "Of Memory and Debris"; Pragda Films

00:00:08.070 --> 00:00:12.616
Between 2015 and 2020, more than 5 million
Venezuelans have left their country,

00:00:12.610 --> 00:00:17.955
fleeing from the economic crisis
and the violence.

00:00:17.955 --> 00:00:22.710
Which means that almost 20%
of the population emigrated.

00:00:28.507 --> 00:00:31.927
Memory

00:00:34.221 --> 00:00:36.682
Caracas, Venezuela.

00:00:36.682 --> 00:00:38.934
Year 2016.

00:00:58.496 --> 00:01:00.998
That's my grandfather, Opa.

00:01:00.998 --> 00:01:03.250
He's 94 years old.

00:01:06.378 --> 00:01:09.381
My grandmother Oma
has had Alzheimer's for 10 years.

00:01:15.387 --> 00:01:19.767
Poor little doggy, poor little baby…

00:01:23.020 --> 00:01:26.190
I'd never heard her sing
before she was diagnosed.

00:01:27.900 --> 00:01:29.401
And those paintings, darling?

00:01:29.944 --> 00:01:32.238
Who made those paintings?

00:01:32.738 --> 00:01:34.740
I didn't. I cut it out from here.

00:01:34.907 --> 00:01:39.120
Marisa Sosa de Rivas painted
those paintings, who is she?

00:01:39.370 --> 00:01:41.740
That lady who lives next door.

00:01:41.740 --> 00:01:42.957
This one here.

00:01:43.457 --> 00:01:44.890
You painted them.

00:01:45.240 --> 00:01:46.460
This one here,

00:01:46.580 --> 00:01:49.964
this beautiful woman and a great artist.

00:01:49.964 --> 00:01:51.549
Yes.

00:01:55.803 --> 00:01:59.390
Wait until they bring the food.

00:02:01.600 --> 00:02:05.187
Wait, there's nothing there yet.

00:02:08.232 --> 00:02:10.651
Easy my love,

00:02:10.650 --> 00:02:13.112
wait until the food is served.

00:02:13.487 --> 00:02:18.033
- But they don't bring it.
-They'll bring it soon, and put it there.

00:02:18.325 --> 00:02:21.996
- That's crazy.
- Please put the fork aside.

00:02:23.831 --> 00:02:26.709
Perfect.

00:02:27.001 --> 00:02:29.003
Are you ok?

00:02:29.170 --> 00:02:31.172
Are you tired?

00:02:31.213 --> 00:02:33.215
Oh well.

00:02:33.841 --> 00:02:37.178
Don't worry. We'll relax soon.

00:02:37.720 --> 00:02:40.306
- Fifty and sixty.
- Huh?

00:02:40.556 --> 00:02:43.350
- Fifty and sixty.
- Oh yeah, fifty and sixty...

00:02:43.976 --> 00:02:46.770
- That's good.
- Yes indeed.

00:02:47.188 --> 00:02:50.357
- We are having lunch.
- What's this?

00:02:50.566 --> 00:02:53.736
- That's a coaster, darling.
- Oh, yeah?

00:02:53.903 --> 00:02:56.280
That's for your glass,
don't you remember?

00:02:56.280 --> 00:02:58.574
- Yes.
- Well, that's good.

00:02:59.658 --> 00:03:01.202
The pasta is coming.

00:03:01.410 --> 00:03:03.746
That scares me.

00:03:05.915 --> 00:03:09.210
Careful, my love.

00:03:15.674 --> 00:03:18.302
Of the 7 children Opa and Oma had,

00:03:18.761 --> 00:03:21.764
only one lives in Caracas.

00:03:29.772 --> 00:03:32.066
She was famous…

00:03:32.358 --> 00:03:34.652
the Chihuahua, the little one.

00:03:51.418 --> 00:03:53.754
Goodbye, my Oma.

00:04:20.948 --> 00:04:24.660
To Opa, phone calls are exclusively
to set up meetings,

00:04:24.660 --> 00:04:28.872
so it's been almost impossible to
support him in his grief from abroad.

00:04:33.752 --> 00:04:36.130
He's not quite himself on the phone.

00:04:42.386 --> 00:04:46.515
Criminal courts from five
Chavista-ruled states,

00:04:46.515 --> 00:04:50.561
canceled the collection process
of 1% of the signatures needed

00:04:50.561 --> 00:04:53.564
to activate the recall referendum
against Nicolás Maduro.

00:04:53.564 --> 00:04:57.526
The sentence is based on alleged
irregularities done by the opposition.

00:05:01.780 --> 00:05:04.450
From a while back, when Opa's friends
started passing away,

00:05:04.450 --> 00:05:07.578
he swore he wouldn't go to burials anymore.

00:05:07.745 --> 00:05:10.914
He only broke his rule
to mourn the love of his life,

00:05:10.914 --> 00:05:13.459
who he still feels beside him.

00:05:45.574 --> 00:05:48.452
One, two, three, four…

00:05:48.452 --> 00:05:50.900
five, six, seven, eight, nine...

00:05:50.913 --> 00:05:53.791
ten, eleven and twelve.

00:05:55.167 --> 00:05:57.086
Quiet, Flash!

00:06:11.892 --> 00:06:15.312
Ok, my love. That's great.

00:06:15.771 --> 00:06:17.940
God bless you.

00:06:17.940 --> 00:06:20.109
Goodbye, darling.

00:08:05.506 --> 00:08:09.259
Debris

00:08:12.346 --> 00:08:14.598
This is Jaime,

00:08:16.016 --> 00:08:18.268
my wife’s grandfather,

00:08:20.145 --> 00:08:22.064
we call him Ababo.

00:08:40.541 --> 00:08:42.459
Ababo is 81 years old.

00:08:44.545 --> 00:08:46.713
But his spirit is young.

00:09:02.062 --> 00:09:04.773
Ababo has two daughters and one son.

00:09:13.365 --> 00:09:14.741
His eldest daughter,

00:09:14.741 --> 00:09:16.326
my wife's mother,

00:09:16.326 --> 00:09:18.370
emigrated to Canada ten years ago.

00:09:37.764 --> 00:09:40.767
His passions are “white” and “yellow”.

00:09:42.185 --> 00:09:45.314
That’s what he calls silver and gold.

00:09:46.940 --> 00:09:50.444
Ababo insists that these code words
are more necessary now than ever.

00:09:51.862 --> 00:09:55.282
You never know who’s listening.

00:10:32.569 --> 00:10:36.615
Each day, Ababo goes to his abandoned
“yellow” processing factory,

00:10:37.074 --> 00:10:40.077
at the center of Caracas,
where he also grew up.

00:11:02.140 --> 00:11:04.685
In the 90's, Ababo was kidnapped in this very factory,

00:11:04.685 --> 00:11:06.103
by the guerrilla.

00:11:06.103 --> 00:11:08.188
They wanted money for their cause.

00:11:08.772 --> 00:11:10.857
They are now the government.

00:11:15.654 --> 00:11:18.115
Ababo scrapes these sewers,

00:11:18.448 --> 00:11:20.951
to find remnants of "yellow",

00:11:21.243 --> 00:11:24.246
accumulated by years of work with this mineral.

00:11:29.626 --> 00:11:31.837
He once described it to me like this:

00:11:32.462 --> 00:11:34.005
Precious metal,

00:11:34.172 --> 00:11:35.465
soft,

00:11:37.217 --> 00:11:39.010
Yellow.

00:11:41.513 --> 00:11:42.597
Its symbol

00:11:43.265 --> 00:11:45.642
"Au"

00:11:47.227 --> 00:11:48.687
from the Latin,

00:11:48.770 --> 00:11:49.855
"Aurum"

00:11:51.022 --> 00:11:53.275
"Shiny sunrise".

00:12:49.331 --> 00:12:50.540
Every day,

00:12:50.916 --> 00:12:54.920
Ababo makes sure there are no holes
thugs could get through.

00:13:14.773 --> 00:13:17.609
But he trusts they won't know

00:13:17.859 --> 00:13:19.861
how to turn trash into “yellow”.

00:13:39.589 --> 00:13:44.135
The family fears Ababo might
hurt himself at the factory.

00:13:45.303 --> 00:13:48.473
But he says that's his only source of income.

00:13:54.604 --> 00:13:56.314
He also says,

00:13:56.690 --> 00:13:58.984
that if he dies in that factory,

00:13:58.984 --> 00:14:00.902
he would die happy.

00:14:16.126 --> 00:14:20.255
Ababo traded the little “yellow” he
accumulated over the last few months,

00:14:21.006 --> 00:14:23.884
for the chance to come to
our wedding in Canada.

00:15:09.304 --> 00:15:11.723
So I treasure this moment.

00:15:12.432 --> 00:15:15.143
Filming you.

00:15:15.310 --> 00:15:18.605
To keep you close to me.

00:15:33.745 --> 00:15:37.791
But I live with the uncertainty
of not knowing when we'll see you again.

00:15:38.249 --> 00:15:41.169
And whether we'll be able to
make up for the time we lost.

00:15:46.007 --> 00:15:50.971
Of Memory and Debris

00:15:54.975 --> 00:15:58.979
for you, mommy.