Immigration is a hot-button issue in this year's political debates. Sleep Dealer director Alex Rivera may have "solved" the immigration problem. Wiredreports that in the movie Sleep Dealer the life force of Mexican workers is sent to the U.S. while their bodies stay in Mexico.
In Tijuana, Memo becomes entwined with a Latino military contractor, who operates drones around the world from his base in San Diego, and an aspiring journalist who sells her memories -- the blogs of the future -- online.
Rivera said the inspiration for the film came from a Wired magazine article about the emerging "global village." It was published around the same time that the U.S. government began building walls along the country's border with Mexico.
That ironic juxtaposition started Rivera thinking: What if technology could extract the life force from the Mexican population and send it north?
"The problem is that the worker comes with a body," Rivera said. "That body needs health care, and gives birth to children that need to go to school. So keep the body outside of the United States. Suck its energy and leave the cadaver or the problematic shell out of the picture."
He began writing Sleep Dealer in the late 1990s, collaborating on the script with former Sundance award-winner David Riker. As the years passed, real life began making gains on Rivera's dystopian vision.
Immigration is a hot-button issue in this year's political debates. Sleep Dealer director Alex Rivera may have "solved" the immigration problem. Wired reports that in the movie Sleep Dealer the life force of Mexican workers is sent to the U.S. while their bodies stay in Mexico.
