Local award-winning Indigenous documentary ‘First Time Home’ to screen in Spokane

An award-winning documentary about four Indigenous cousins’ journey to Mexico where they got in touch with their roots and saw how farmworkers live will be shown at Magic Lantern Theatre on Friday.

The film “First Time Home” chronicles the four filmmakers’ journey to their family’s ancestral village in Oaxaca for the first time after their grandfather became seriously ill and they wanted to go meet him. While there, they got in touch with their heritage and cultural roots.

“(The filmmakers) had never met their granddad, and they never been to the village where their family’s from in southern Mexico,” said Seth Holmes, producer of the film and an anthropology professor at University of California Berkeley.

Holmes said the four directors are from Indigenous families where some live in Mexico and some live in the U.S. Others involved in making the film are Indigenous people from Mexico, as well, including the graphic designers and musicians.

Noemi Librado Sanchez, a high school student and one of the directors, said she didn’t know she was going to see a lot of things she had heard in stories.

Esmirna Librado, one of the directors and Noemi’s older sister, said she’s proud of being Indigenous, but the trip was more about getting to know about their roots.

While in Mexico, Esmirna said she got to experience what her family members felt about having to leave the country in the 1990s. She said her parents left because they had to, not because they wanted to.

Her parents left the country because they were searching for more opportunities, and the little money they received in their town wasn’t enough to support their families, she said.

From the experience, Esmirna said getting in touch with her roots helped her find her identity and that learning about Mexican culture in the U.S. was different than actually living the culture.

“Going back to Mexico made me really value a lot of where I’m from, my people and my background,” Noemi said.

When she was younger, Noemi said she was bullied for her height and skin color and wished to be different. However, when she went to Mexico and saw her grandparents and how far her parents had come, the experience humbled her and made her value her heritage.

“I feel like, growing up, a lot of people didn’t even like to say they’re Oaxacan because you already know you’re going to get made fun of, you already know people are going to start saying stuff,” Noemi said. “Because of that, a lot of people also didn’t like to say they understood or spoke their parents’ language.”

She said they should be proud and happy they understand and know another language. While describing her parents leaving Mexico and going to the U.S., Noemi said she couldn’t imagine having to leave her parents, adding that it would be like leaving one life to live in a whole different world.

“This film, not only can it teach others and give others an inside view of what it is to live the way that we do and some of the obstacles we have to go through, but it can also help those kids who feel alone or wish to be someone else that it can help them realize that it’s so beautiful; there’s always good in everything,” Noemi said.

“Although there’s obstacles that you have to go through in life, you just have to continue to try to find the better in everything.” Noemi said she hopes the film will make people want to learn more about themselves and be proud of who they are and how far they have come.

Instead of judging them by their physical appearance, what they wear or how they speak, Esmirna said people should first get to know where her people come from and what they do. She said people shouldn’t have to hide where they’re from and should be proud that they are different from others.

Heriberto Ventura and Esmeralda Ventura were the other two filmmakers. Heriberto said he enjoyed getting in touch with his roots and seeing the videos his parents had of when they were younger, seeing pictures of how they lived and going over to Mexico and seeing it all in-person.

He said they got to experience how their people lived and got in touch with their history, what came before them and what would come after them. The film has several messages, but Heriberto said the main one is that “everybody’s story matters; my story matters, and so does your story.”

Holmes said the film is also about the families who work on farms and how immigrant farmworkers stay in touch with each other even if their families are separated by the border between Latin American and the U.S.

“Part of what’s unique about the film is that these four young people who are from Indigenous, Native, binational farmworker families are the ones who really directed the film and are telling their own and their family’s story,” Holmes said, adding that it is a unique opportunity for people in Spokane to hear firsthand from farmworker and Indigenous families who provide the food people eat.

No matter the weather conditions, Esmirna said farmworkers still have to go to work, and most spend their day working and don’t get to spend time with their families. She remembers how her parents left for work before she woke up to go to school, and they would not get home until it was bedtime for her.

“I’m excited that people in Spokane will learn about where our food comes from and the families who are farmworkers who feed us, and that they’ll get to learn those things directly from the families themselves in the film and the directors who come to the Magic Lantern,” Holmes said.

The film has received several awards, including the Rising Voices Award from the Portland Film Festival, a Spotlight Film Gold Award and recently the Youth Voices Award at the San Diego Latino Film Festival.

The film will be shown at 7 p.m. Friday at the Magic Lantern, 25 W. Main Ave. Holmes said there will be a Q&A with two of the filmmakers after the screening. The screening is free and donations accepted at the door will go to the filmmakers and their families.