• Documentary Film
• Projects

This film describes the wave of kidnappings and other crimes that have swept over Mexico in the last decade. Today Mexico has one of the highest incidences of kidnapping in the world, for example, and while the phenomenon was initially a problem for the wealthy elite, it has become increasingly ‘democratized’ (as the rich found ways of protecting themselves). Today, people in all walks of life are ready targets. Via experts (all Mexican) I argue that the sources of this crisis are two-fold: one is the cost of the country’s transition to democracy (much like Iraq post Saddam Hussein, when Mexico’s PRI party started losing power, their control over historically corrupt police was lost). The second is structural deficits in key institutions: police forces that are highly corrupt, poorly paid, and ill-trained; a judicial system where there is no transparency and that has elements that date back to the Holy Inquisition, etc.