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Through a casual Google search director Juan Mandelbaum finds out that Patricia, a long-lost girlfriend from Argentina, is among the thousands who were kidnapped, tortured and then "disappeared" by the military during the 1976-1983 dictatorship.  Juan embarks on a journey to find out what happened to Patricia and others he knew who disappeared, and along the way re-examines his own choices.  Using rare archival footage he evokes the dreams for a revolution that would transform Argentina.  As he shares dramatic stories told by parents, siblings, friends and children of the disappeared, Juan grieves the tragic losses and shows that when brutal regimes attack the fabric of  a country with great impunity, the suffering lasts for generations.  And yet now that the children of the disappeared are themselves becoming parents, it becomes clear that in the end, life wins.

ENGLISH NARRATION WITH SPANISH DIALOGUE SUBTITLED

 

 

 

 

 

Like an archaeologist looking for a lost civilization, filmmaker Juan Mandelbaum searches for hints and stories of victims of Argentina's bloody mid-'70s era in the sensitively rendered "Our Disappeared.
Robert Koehler
Variety
full review

Many a man has spent a movie searching for a lost love. Few have wound up telling the story of revolutionary South America in the process.
Wesley Morris
The Boston Globe
full review

2008 was another banner year for excellent Boston documentaries. I can name a half-dozen of them, all intelligent, high-minded works. Juan Mandelbaum’s “Our Disappeared” is at the top of the list for its unflinching reopening of Argentina’s dirty war on the left during the 1970s, when thousands of people were murdered, “disappeared,” including a charming ex-girlfriend of the filmmaker. The most chilling moment in a 2008 film: Henry Kissinger, there on the spot in Buenos Aires, blithely endorsing the killing-fields military government.
Gerald Peary
The Phoenix

Incorporating interviews with survivors together with rarely-seen archival footage (including a startling TV clip of U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger praising the Argentine dictators), Our Disappeared—which aired on the PBS series Independent Lens—offers a somber human perspective on a tragic chapter in Latin American history. Recommended.
Video Librarian

Nuestros desaparecidos' es un filme imprescindible para quienes deseen acercarse desde una visión mesurada, pero profunda, para conocer, para comprender.
José-Christian Páez
Globedia
full review

More Reviews

AWARDS & SCREENINGS:

• Independent Lens, PBS

• Human Rights Award, Docúpolis International Documentary Festival, Barcelona

• Gold Remi Award, WorldFest International Independent Film Festival

• Honorable Mention for Best Political Documentary, Philadelphia Independent Film Festival

• Audience Choice Award for Most Popular Documentary, Chicago Latino Film Festival

• Nominee, Fund for Santa Barbara Social Justice Award

• Finalist, 2010 Hillman Prizes in Journalism

• Cine Golden Eagle Award

• Museum of Modern Art, NYC

• Flaherty NYC

• Mumbai International Film Festival

• London Latin American Film Festival

• VI Encuentro Hispanoamericano de Cine y Video Documental Independiente: Contra el Silencio Todas las Voces, Mexico

• Hot Springs Documentary Film Festival

• International Film Festival of Caragena, Columbia

• Santa Barbara International Film Festival

• New York Jewish Film Festival

• Los Angeles Latino International Film Festival

• Encuentros del Otro Cine International Documentary Film Festival, Quito, Ecuador