‘Children of Las Brisas’ documentary screening showcases Venezuelan perseverance

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Director Marianela Maldonado always wanted to highlight the lives of Venezuelan children while also incorporating elements of music within the story. To make this idea a reality, she contacted friend and producer Luisa De La Ville.

“We met and we got along, and then sometime later, she called me and she said that she had this idea of making this movie, and that she didn’t have a producer yet. So I went to Valencia and was there for several days, and I really liked what I saw,” producer De La Ville said.

Ten years later, Maldonado and De La Ville finalized their documentary film “Children of Las Brisas.” Both Maldonado and De La Ville stopped by the Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs and screened the film this past Monday as part of Maxwell’s Program of Latin America and the Caribbean (PLACA), showcasing to community members the perseverance and resistance of the citizens of Venezuela.

Alicia Ríos, associate professor of Spanish at SU, said that introducing narratives from many different perspectives and cultures is important to PLACA. Bringing this film to SU aligned well with their goals.

“At PLACA, we like to present all sorts of things in relation to Latin America. When I saw the possibility of presenting the documentary, bringing to campus the director and the producer, I consulted with the Advisory Board and we all thought it was a very good opportunity,” Ríos said. “We hope to include more films and documentaries to our already rich program of events.”

“Children of Las Brisas” focuses on the lives of three Venezuelan children — Dissandra, Edixon and Wuilly — who form part of the “El Sistema,” a musical program founded by José Antonio Abreu in the 1970s. Over the years, “El Sistema” got controlled by the Venezuelan government and was used for propaganda.

Throughout their journey, the children faced difficult circumstances, including poverty and dealing with legal documents that led to some of them quitting their dreams of becoming musicians and ultimately leaving their country.

After working together on a previous film, Marianela Maldonado (far right) and Luisa De La Ville (center) reconnected to work on a new project entitled “Children of Las Brisas.” The film represents the perseverance, resilience and strength of the Venezuelan people.
Isabella Flores | Staff Photographer

Having the film centered on the lives of the children and their journeys was important to Maldonado because she wanted to recognize the events that were actively occurring in the lives of the kids.

“They have you go to their home and they are practicing and practicing. “Oh, there is this important concert”, and so we knew we had to film that because that’s where their heart was,” Maldonado said.

Due to setbacks like the Venezuelan government crisis and the COVID-19 pandemic, the film took 10 years to develop. Maldonado said that during these 10 years, she saw the children grow and change. Dissandra was nine years old the last time they shot with her. Now, she’s 22.

Maldonado said that she always wanted to create a film that could represent Venezuela and the “El Sistema” program because of the strong emotional connection she made with the children of Las Brisas neighborhood.

“I wanted to tell a story about Venezuela,” Maldonado said. “I started researching, I went to Caracas, I went to other orchestras, but finally it was in Las Brisas where I found that emotional connection with the kids, because that orchestra would just open.”

When speaking about how they chose the children to feature in the film, Maldonado said that they filmed the people that wanted to share their stories and “open their hearts.”

“It has a lot to do with intuition and with natural organic connections. So Dissandra, I became friends with her since the first day. She invited me literally after half an hour, I was talking to her,” Maldonado said. “She said, ‘come to my home,’ she was this bubbling girl so obviously she wanted to be part of it.”

“Children of Las Brisas” represents the characteristics of perseverance, resilience and strength through an impactful film that exposes the reality of life in Venezuela. Poverty, the loss of support from the government and oppression is the reality that Venezuelan citizens confront in their daily lives, Maldonado said.

“The threat was to have the journey that the kids were experiencing with the music, it was a musical journey,” Maldonado said.