By M. Sellers Johnson.
What I’m hoping to do with this documentary is present a relatively coherent blueprint for what other people go through. The first step to any sort of material change is how we see and talk to each other. To reminds us, that we are all human beings. I feel that the documentary form can do that.”
—Nathaniel Lezra
From Necolí to New York—through jungles both concrete and tropical—migrants from South America (and beyond) traverse many logistical and lethal forces on the road to refuge. In pursuit of passage and asylum, the subjects of Nathaniel Lezra’s political documentary Roads of Fire (2025) are compelled to navigate the trials of transit to a nation that may no longer maintain the privileges once promised to its immigrants.
Roads of Fire charts this migrant journey from the edge of rural Venezuela and Ecuador to the metropolitan of New York City. Through three weaving story threads, Lezra explores everything from the hurdles and dangers of the refugee journey through the South and Central America, the nonprofits that struggle to support their philanthropic work against the inequities of political forces (local to federal), and the protracted process many refugees face in seeking asylum in the United States.
With great care taken to its subjects, Roads of Fire is an elucidating film in raising issues of awareness around global migration through state corruption, bickering politicians, warring migrant smugglers, and the looming rise of global nationalism that threatens our transnational communities. Here, Lezra discusses the impact of social awareness, the hidden travails of the migrant journey, and the network of bureaucratic and guerilla forces (both domestic and abroad) that undercut asylum seekers in their incendiary journeys to sanctuary.
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Your film details several vantage points on the global migrant crisis, including New York-based NGOs on the front line of humanitarian outreach, migrant smugglers at the threshold of Darién Gap, and an Ecuadorian mother seeking asylum in NYC. Tell us about your decision for structuring these three major sections and how you came into contact with these organizations and people.
It was a journey to get to that architecture. The film has lived a few different lives, in terms of its construction. To start at the chronology of production, it began without an explicit desire to tell a Latin American story, or a story focused specifically on that group of people. Initially, when I was working on my previous film about teenage Ukrainian refugees fleeing combat [Don’t Leave Me Behind: Stories of Young Ukrainian Survival, 2023], our editing bay was in Midtown. And as we were finishing that film, we would end our workday, walk outside, and quickly be confronted by huge lines of people. This would have been in 2022, at the early stages of what would then accelerate into the crisis. In these lines, you would see families bereft and confused, walking around New York and trying to figure out where they were. What struck me at the time was the lack of coherent city response, or personnel on the ground helping these people who were clearly very lost. It wasn’t even that there was such an overwhelming humanitarian disaster in front of us, at that stage. It was more just that there were lines of incredibly confused, dehydrated, and hungry people. Some of whom have not eaten in four or five days. With this as a starting point, in lieu of the administration response, we saw these NGOs out on the streets giving out food, guidance, translation services, and things of that nature.
The initial construction was a question of, what were the mental health implications for the volunteers? That was my initial perception to the issue. I have, probably a very broad, generalized conception of how people are feeling, having left their countries and forced to flee. Having worked on the previous film, I was curious about how American NGOs felt when their city is a sanctuary city, but that sanctuary city that isn’t doing anything. After that first step, I keyed in with Adama [Bah] through that process, of first watching and speaking to people. Adama is a total rock star. She runs an NGO called Afrikana and is sort of a city-wide fixer, bouncing from organization to organization, helping people.
At first, you watch in the film (in the chronology of the film, itself) decide to go from being about NGOs to being about refugee experiences, more holistically. Early in this process, I was shooting with Adama in production, and she got that call from EV Loves NYC, where there had been some miscommunication with the local faith groups supporting refugees. They had arrived too early at the doorsteps at EV Loves NYC, which was (at that time) primarily a food insecurity space from the pandemic era that supported New Yorkers. But it was evolving into an emergency response site for refugees and asylum seekers. And in one instance, eight hundred to a thousand people had shown up at seven am, when the building didn’t open until ten. At that time, there was no food or support staff, all during late-November/early-December. Having traveled from the South, few people had jackets and children were freezing. This was the first time that I saw what seemed to be the early stages of a humanitarian disaster.
In knowing Adama, I went to visit EV Loves and met Sasha [Allenby] and Mammad [Mahmoodi], who co-founded the organization. And then through that connection, I met Father Mike, who then introduced me to our primary asylum seeker Maria, who fled Ecuador. So, the chronology of the film reflects my own eyes opening to realize that this documentary can’t just be about the NGO experience. At that stage it became a two-hander of what can the asylum experience look like from the NGO perspective, and then again from the asylum seeker perspective? As I got to know Maria more and we became increasingly good friends, I realized that her experiences in Ecuador were so vital to understanding this geopolitical perspective. The film needed to perform the function of being a blueprint for the viewer to understand [holistically] the entire “migratory chain.” That is, the entire series of events that addresses why someone is fleeing a country, what are the circumstances that create a condition in which they have to flee, what are the steps that one takes as they flee, what is the initial outcome of that flight, and then what’s on the other side of the border, once they have to navigate the bureaucratic process? That’s when I realized that the film is about tracking an asylum case, while also offering a glimpse of the geopolitical history of migration in the Western Hemisphere through these different lenses.
I should briefly say that we were also following the story of another traveler from Afghanistan. So, the story could have been radically different on who the focus point might have been. Though, that participant wisely declined to participate until the after the outcome of his asylum case. And I do see the film as one half of a bigger project, that should continue to look at the Mediterranean region, the Middle East, and elsewhere. One of the brutal realities that I encountered was that this story [while it is singular to her] is utterly not unique. That people from Mozambique, Myanmar, Afghanistan, and Northern Africa have all experienced similar things. This all being the broad architecture of the story of the film.
I needed the audience to understand that when you meet people on the street that look completely destitute or stretched entirely too thin—those who are exhausted or maybe selling candy bars on the subway—that person, six months ago, could have easily been a doctor, an engineer, a nurse practitioner, or upholsters, or any working-class individual.”
Early in the doc, you position global migration as a business, valued at $42 billion [apparently a low figure]. Could you elaborate more on this point, since this statistic may come as a surprise to many folks?
This is a complicated statistic. There really should be an asterisk next to it because of the complexity of sources. Initially, the number came from an analysis done by Reuters and then backed up by congressional investigation into smuggling. The thing about that number, is that it’s based on the semantic definition of the industry, stemming from what trackable sources of revenue streams there are. You can estimate that number based on a broad analysis of what cartels are doing or based on the testimonies of those arrested. It’s a broad investigative number that is legitimate insofar as it is presents parameters for what we understand that business to be. But it’s tricky. Similar to when Congress did their investigation of the death toll of people crossing the Darién. Because, how do you really know what that number is? The only way for that toll to be even close to adequately reported, would be for a multinational coalition of people to trawl the base of the Gulf of Urabá and to go through the Darién Gap, to speak to the various different criminal organizations, and also the smaller, singular parties of human traffickers that exist and operate within the jungle itself and in southern Mexico. People who are absolutely not on the radar of any of these countries or armies. Only with that sort of hypothetical, massive multinational coalition would you actually be able to get a sense of the number of people who drowned off the boats, en route to the jungle. Let alone, in the jungle itself.
As for the business number in the film, it assesses [from the moment of fleeing] in a trackable number, what people are paying. I needed the audience to understand that when you meet people on the street that look completely destitute or stretched entirely too thin—those who are exhausted or maybe selling candy bars on the subway—that person, six months ago, could have easily been a doctor, an engineer, a nurse practitioner, or upholsters, or any working-class individual. It’s such a range. There are even people who are absolutely what we would consider upper middle class. To really understand that from the moment you flee, every step you take you are upcharged drastically. Things like bottled water from street vendors, food, police [aware that you are fleeing] who need to be bribed. There are fixers who put you on buses that need to be paid, and drivers of those buses. On the road, as you’re traveling, each county border that you cross there may be bribes to pay. Smugglers will also charge a general overarching package to get you to a safe house or your intermediary destination. Even then, you’ll need to resupply on provisions for the jungle, while covering the multilayered access through the jungle itself. With each cartel that controls that region.
So, every step that you take, every piece of equipment that you buy, and every item of food you consume, is both upcharged and is designed explicitly to exploit you financially. Forget about the United States or the southern Mexican border, even getting through the jungle you have to interact with the Panamanian army and other forces. All of whom know you’re traveling illegally—though, while fleeing, the concept of legal or illegal is complicated. They are aware that you’re paying illicit operators to get somewhere, and they will all [absolutely] charge some form of money.
Ultimately, in the film, that number is the best effort to track those costs, as much as we can tag it to the Gulf Cartel and the participating/collaborating operators. But I think that we should question exactly how real that number is [when semantics can change] and also recognize that we are in a woefully inadequate space to invest this stuff to begin with, in accurately reporting refugees.
What can you share about your experience in dealing with the AGC Gulf Cartel. Especially following the Venezuelan family departing Acandí into jungles of Columbia-Panama.
They were interesting, and we directly interacted with them in some ways. A key point is that they were aware of us before we even got there. One must understand that the power structures in place are so interwoven between the police, cartels, and smugglers. One of the first questions I asked [as an American] was “What gang runs this area? Who do we need to speak to, to make sure we are aware of each other? That we’re safe and playing by their rules?” Each time I would ask this question, the locals would have this glazed look on their face and respond with, “They are all the same people.” In the United States, we have these delineations of illegal or legal, illicit, clandestine, legitimate, and so on and so forth. We have these conceptions of right and wrong. Shadow economies or legitimate economies, and things like that.
The power structures for certain nations ultimately need to exist in order to support those who are there. So, FARC [Revolutionary Armed Forces of Columbia], Tren de Aragua, the cops, immigration; all of these different operators are all in handshake agreements with each other. All of the money flows through all of them. FARC [i.e., the guerillas] are remainders from a paramilitary/post-civil war era. They moonlight as security for the cartel—who are also FARC. These people are all one and the same. What you then realize is that everyone is aware of you, everyone knows you’re there. And that value of this migrant smuggling and human trafficking business is so valuable, that as long as you play by the rules set forward, you’ll be okay. All of the smugglers and operators seen in the film under the oversight of the cartel.
I don’t believe that our civic infrastructure is so lacking that there shouldn’t be a way to receive people coherently and safely. There seems to be this fundamental misunderstanding of what asylum is and what it requires. So, when New York City says that it’s a sanctuary city, then that’s a great concept. One that I believe in and feel that all American cities should have.”
With emphatic nationalism sweeping, not only our nation, but many across the globe, migrants face surmounting challenges in securing medical aid and basic resources. How do you view these issues as a United States citizen and if you could implement direct changes to immigration policies, what would they be?
Twisting the aperture a little bit on that question, I might ask, “What problems do I see as more reconcilable than others. The biggest problem that we see, is not actually volume. Though volume has become a problem in this country, because we didn’t have a coherent system, in order to receive that volume. People were coming based on a broad narrative that’s existed since the birth of the country—further reinforced in the twentieth century. That of a country of immigrants, by immigrants. While that narrative was being put forward, it was simultaneously undermined by our actions in Latin America that created the first generation of these migrants coming North.
I don’t believe that our civic infrastructure is so lacking that there shouldn’t be a way to receive people coherently and safely. There seems to be this fundamental misunderstanding of what asylum is and what it requires. So, when New York City says that it’s a sanctuary city, then that’s a great concept. One that I believe in and feel that all American cities should have. To be place where people should be able to come to, if they are in trouble or need help. And for us to ensure that we have obligation legally to provide them with that help. That we’re not a place that leaves people die in the streets, or forcibly jails them just for being here.
Interdepartmental communication doesn’t exist to help in this way. But if it does, it’s often used as a political tactic to create undue pressure on people. Even when people arrive (in huge volumes) at the southern border, the vast majority of them, including those entering illegally do check in at the major checkpoints, and are processed. Through this processing, most people are typically jailed for a minimum of two weeks and then are paroled into the country. When they are paroled, they are given a mandate that directs them to submit their asylum application, if you’re claiming asylum. Once you’re paroled into the country, you are legally allowed to be here. But then you’ll have a timeline to submit your asylum papers, otherwise you will be issued what is called an order for removal, and then scheduled for deportation. Though, the vast majority of people that I spoke to during that process, did not speak English, and neither did the U.S. officials speak Spanish when giving those instructions. Translation services weren’t available in the detainment center, so when the refugees or migrants were handed those papers, they did not understand the weight of that timeline and obligation. So, you have these people here legally, but who do not understand what these conceptions or deadlines are.
There’s also this perception of asylum as a clear by-step procedure, and that asylum is an all-encompassing term that is the dream of life, happiness, and liberty. This is a farcical notion. The process of being processed and paroled in, has absolutely nothing to do with housing system on New York City. Those departments barely interact. So, the people sent on a bus here, by Greg Abbott to New York, don’t have clear instructions or liaisons shuttling them to shelters or securing housing for them right away. There’s no proper communication between the housing and municipal shelter system of NYC and the El Paso border crossing. People get caught in these bureaucratic gridlocks of communication, where not enough leadership in any of these departments are communicating enough or understanding what actually needs to happen to create systems that work.
More specifically, the first thing that I would do, would be to implement a more straightforward system at the border. This might look something like a housing voucher program. Where after you’re processed, paroled, and first leaving the detention center, you depart with some sort of housing voucher, that also specifies your court date, what shelter to report to, and a pamphlet in Spanish. This could also serve as a translation service, to help one get in touch with an attorney, who will be the point of contact for one’s asylum court. Just a simple, assured resource document, in the language that that person speaks, showing them where they are going, where their court date is, what shelter they are staying in, and the exact steps that they need to take in transitioning to the new country. I think a financial stipend would also be really helpful. Especially, considering that NYC spent a stomach-churning amount of money on misallocated contacts with various organizations, that were either embezzled or misused. But if we were to give a waiver that was specifically stipulated to be used for food and rent, I truly believe that after one month, most of these families would be working and self-sustaining.
Your previous documentary feature details refugees from Ukraine. With Roads of Fire, we follow the long journey North for migrants and refugees through South and Central America. How can the documentary mode be used as a tool to address these issues and galvanize effective change?
It’s a question that a grapple with often and have very mixed feelings about. A positive answer to this goes back to the Ukraine documentary. That film was for Paramount, so it had a good amount of financial support, in terms of its rollout. When it was release, it received quite a bit of attention and played at a conference for the World Health Organization. A convening of what I might call, “the global mental health apparatus.” The film screened in person there and also on Zoom in Ukraine. The WHO even wrote us a really great note, which expressed that the film had participated actively and had been a part of the topic of conversations held at that conference. Conversations that centered on the question of how to reallocate resources to specifically handle refugee mental health. That is, how to build an architecture of receiving and helping people. This was a lovely thing to know, but did that materially impact the lives of people? I have no idea.
So, with Roads of Fire, I think about the role the documentary plays in conversation and the value of those conversations. And what I’m hoping to do with this film is present a relatively coherent blueprint for what other people go through. The first step to any sort of material change is how we see and talk to each other. To reminds us, that we are all human beings. I feel that the documentary form can do that. Though, the reality is also that the typical documentary is not everyone’s immediate popcorn flick to throw on, on a Friday night. Especially, a social impact documentary that has a lot to say. Hopefully (a) that changes in its own right, but (b) that people do see this and understand that this is not a partisan piece attacking a party. The sole objective is to tell you a story and that by the end of it, you may be moved and understand your neighbor a little bit more. I think that’s a starting point.
Speaking for myself or people like me, our role can only be to increase empathy and create an understanding of what people are going through. When everything is distilled into the echo chamber prism of social media, where the most invigorating and impactful factors are hatred, confusion, and fear—those being the algorithmic elements through which people interact with one another—we then realize that we need to break that model of judgement or prejudice. To understand more of what that worker, colleague, or neighbor may have gone through. Perhaps, that may nudge the needle of pain, hatred, and confusion that is gripping this country.
Your company Lezra Films has produced a variety of commercials, narratives shorts, and documentary projects. What is your ideal goal for the company and how would you like to see it grow?
We’re very slowing expanding. We also do a lot of social impact and production work under the banner of Doc Creative. The focus remains humanist storytelling, that tries to challenge people’s perceptions. We do some brand work, though even that brand work tends to have a sort of social thumbprint. My goal is to expand the documentary work, overall. We’re engaging with some networks and building out our voice in the industry. I really value our freedom and our freelance ethos. We can, sort of, pick and choose our contracts, and build upon what’s interesting to us. It’s also very risky, obviously. Falling in love with a project and then having to battle for independent investment.
I’d like to keep going and we’ve very lucky. This is a completely inscrutable and impossible business, on so many levels for so many reasons. To be able to make work and keep the lights on is a great goal. I’m simply happy with that. Though, I’d like for us to have a little more continuity between projects and expand so that there may be multiple projects happening simultaneously, rather than one project being completely consuming. I’m also interested in elevating the voices of the other people that we work with. Everyone in our team rolodex are all filmmakers, who come from different places and have different stories to tell. The next steps would be expanding a little bit and opening up our voice.
M. Sellers Johnson is an independent scholar and editor whose research interests include French art cinema, transnationalism, historiography, and aesthetics. He received his MA from Te Herenga Waka (Victoria University of Wellington) in 2021 and his BA at the University of North Carolina Wilmington in 2018. His work has appeared in Afterimage, Film International, Film Quarterly, Media Peripheries, Mise-en-scène, Offscreen, and sabah ülkesi, among other outlets. He is the founding Citation Ethics Editor for Film Matters, and the current Book Reviews Editor for New Review of Film and Television Studies.