A swarm of rats squeaking in your ears while you crawl through the small tunnel towards “freedom” I believe sounds like the true horror . El Norte, a movie about immigrants, that gives you an interesting perspective of why crawling through a tunnel filled with rats is the least horrifying thing that can come in between while hoping the borders to another universe. This movie was made in the early 80s, 1982. Gregory Nava, a man who directed most iconic latino movies, was also a director and writer of this movie El Norte. The movie takes place in 3 different areas. First part of the movie called Arturo Xuneax took place in Guatemala. Part 2 of the movie El Coyote took place in Mexico. Lastly part 3, named The North, took place in the United States. The story follows a brother and sister, Rosa and Enrique leaving Guatemala to find their way to the United States illegally.  

Rosa, daughter of Arturo Xuneax is a Naive girl but does not shy away from the struggle she will have to face during her journey. Rosa heard quite a lot of things about the north starting from “even the poorest up there have toilets” or “with one switch the light turns on”. Which only made her more determined to cross the border. 

Enrique, a very hardworking character with a fun personality that almost gives you a soft spot for him, made the story heartwarming. In El Norte Enrique gets many opportunities to make something better for himself but ends up always choosing his family first. 

The plot of El Norte is so great because of the mystery. It has many clues throughout the movies which is what I believe kept the watcher watching it over and over again for example, the circles. There's circles throughout the movie, some are half and others are full. Each of those circles have meaning to it that might just spoil the whole ending if you find the meaning of it in the beginning, but I doubt you will. 

This movie truly does not shy away from the struggles immigrants face. Some scenes in this movie are so horrific that it makes a horror movie look like a comedy.  I would recommend El Norte to anyone wanting to see a skin crawling movie that keeps you on the edge of your seat with hidden clues. Even watching this movie for the 5th time, it will keep you on your toes to find the true meaning of some of the clues which you might've missed the first 4th time. You should watch this movie if you wanna see the perspective of an alien coming to earth.