International Premiere
“We search for lives in the path of death.” This slogan propels the Caravan of Mothers of Missing Migrants forward in A Place of Absence, Marialuisa Ernst’s remarkable debut about grief that refuses to stand still. Along migration routes through Mexico and toward the United States, Central American mothers search for their children who disappeared while migrating north. Ernst joins the group on the road, reflecting on her own family history and the disappearance of her uncle Guillermo during Argentina’s Dirty War.
As they travel, the road, the family archive, the forest, and the body become places where absence is carried and named. Verité footage, family conversations, archival traces, performance, and the natural world all express common needs: for bodies, for answers, and for care strong enough to survive institutional silence. Winner of the inaugural Aquí y Allá Award and honoured at Salem Film Fest with the American Cinematographer Award, A Place of Absence is a cinematic offering of hope in the midst of immense loss.
Content Considerations: Nudity, forced disappearances, state dictatorships, drug-cartel-related disappearances
Best Documentary Feature, San Diego 2026
Oct 7 & 11: Filmmaker Q&A
Media Partner
Community Partner
Anita Zelaya, Leticia Martinez, Yolanda Ernst
USA/Bolivia/Mexico
2026
In Spanish and English with English subtitles
Book Tickets
Indigenous & Community Access
Indigenous Access Tickets Community Access Tickets Ticket Donation Requests
Credits & Director
Executive Producer
Kirsten Johnson, Cecilia Aldarondo, Susan Margolin, Melanie Greenberg
Producer
Marialuisa Ernst
Screenwriter
Marialuisa Ernst
Cinematography
Erik Shirai, J. Bennett, Julian Amaru
Editor
Matthew Cohn, Jay Sterrenberg, Marialuisa Santos, Titi Viera-Gallo
Original Music
Miranda y Tobar
Marialuisa Ernst
Director, producer, and writer Marialuisa Ernst (she/they) is a queer transcultural artist originally from Bolivia and Chile, now based in New York. Over the past decade, she has created intimate, political cinema that explores personal loss, memory, and the invisible threads that connect humanity. Her feature debut, Place of Absence (2025), premiered at DOC NYC, won Best Documentary Feature at the San Diego Latino Film Festival, and participated in the Cannes Film Festival Marché du Film. She is a proud member of the International Documentary Association, the Documentary Producers Alliance, Brown Girls Doc Mafia, and Film Fatales.
Filmography: Tracers (2015); Nous York (2012); Happiness Never Comes Alone (2012)
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