Not your typical Salvadoran torture story

Elpidia Carrillo

Barbara Williams

Trever O&apos;Brien

Lindy Laub

In 1986 LA, an illegal immigrant (Elpidia Carrillo) suffers from past tortures in her native El Salvador. Her husband had been killed and her two children taken from her. She was an educated teacher with a philosophy degree, but n...

They Come at Night

At first, I thought, &quot;Okay, I&apos;ve seen this before. Salvadoran woman comes to Los Angeles but can&apos;t shake the memories of torture at the hands of the death squads.&quot; But there&apos;s a lot more to &quot;They Come at Night.&quot; The unlikely friendship that develops between the refugee and her psychologist causes the latter to upset the balance her professional responsibilities and the needs of her family, while pushing against the edges of confidentiality and detachment. But the film finds time for genuine warmth and humor while exposing the atrocities of the US-funded and -trained death squads, all without crossing the line into overt preachiness. You&apos;ll have to suspend your assumptions as I did, but &quot;They Come at Night&quot; is well worth it.

At first, I thought, "Okay, I've seen this before. Salvadoran woman comes to Los Angeles but can't shake the memories of torture at the hands of the death squads." But there's a lot more to "They Come at Night." The unlikely friendship that develops between the refugee and her psychologist causes the latter to upset the balance her professional responsibilities and the needs of her family, while pushing against the edges of confidentiality and detachment. But the film finds time for genuine warmth and humor while exposing the atrocities of the US-funded and -trained death squads, all without crossing the line into overt preachiness. You'll have to suspend your assumptions as I did, but "They Come at Night" is well worth it.

In 1986 LA, an illegal immigrant (Elpidia Carrillo) suffers from past tortures in her native El Salvador. Her husband had been killed and her two children taken from her. She was an educated teacher with a philosophy degree, but now is forced to take only the most menial tasks and lives in a roach-infested dwelling. This fragile woman is turned over to a case worker (Barbara Williams), who is recently divorced and is struggling as a single mother to her young son. These two very different women make contact and the therapist decides to help the Latin American find her children. Inquiries leads to the children being in Mexico and with a high enough fee, they can be smuggled into the US.

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They Come at Night

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