The Poetic Justice Film Festival presents a screening of Sansón and Me followed by a post-film discussion with filmmaker Rodrigo Reyes. 

Reyes, born in Mexico City in 1983, is a filmmaker deeply grounded in his identity as an migrant artist. He crafts a poetic gaze from the margins, using striking imagery to portray the contradictory nature of our shared world while revealing the potential for transformative change.

Reyes received support from The Mexican Film Institute (IMCINE), Sundance and Tribeca Institutes. His films have been screened on PBS and Netflix. 499 won Best Cinematography at Tribeca and the Special Jury Award at Hot Docs. He is a recipient of prestigious awards such as the Guggenheim and Creative Capital Awards, the Rainin Fellowship, the SF Indie Vanguard Award and the Eureka Fellowship.

Sansón and Me won the Best Film Award at Sheffield DocFest and is the opening film for the 2023 season premiere of the celebrated documentary series Independent Lens on PBS.

During his day job as a Spanish criminal interpreter in a small town in California, filmmaker Rodrigo Reyes met a young man named Sansón, an undocumented Mexican immigrant who was sentenced to life in prison without parole. Sansón and Reyes worked together over a decade, using hundreds of letters as inspiration for recreations of Sansón's childhood, featuring members of Sansón's own family. The result is a vibrant portrait of a friendship navigating immigration and the depths of the criminal justice system, pushing the boundaries of cinematic imagination to rescue a young migrant's story from oblivion.

This event is part of the Poetic Justice Film Festival (PJFF), an initiative of the William James Association. PJFF is a free screening and speaker series throughout California, spotlighting films about the transformative power of the arts for currently and formerly incarcerated people. 

NR, 86 mins., 2023. In Spanish with closed captions (CC) in English.

Connect: 

Poetic Justice Film Festival - Instagram

William James Association - Website 

Presented by the William James Association and SFPL’s Jail and Reentry Department.