Short Stop: Remember Us recalls horrors of the Salvadoran Civil War

One of the strange things about American is how our history and our politics feel like they should be known everywhere. Part of it is because the US is such a massive player on the world stage, so what happens here has ripple effects across the globe. Part of it, too, is the hubris that is as American as apple pie, that sort of bloated nationalism that "We're #1" so obviously everyone knows what goes on here.

The flip side of that is, I feel like we Americans are woefully uneducated about world history. I feel like I'm constantly learning about new conflicts and tragedies from around the world, often because of movies I'm watching. Of course, it's impossible for anyone to be informed on all of them -- we're human, so the horrors are countless. But it still feels crazy to find out about all of these wars that impacted so many lives that I never knew happened.

Remember Us, from director Pablo Leon, recounts the horrors of the Salvadoran Civil War that spanned more than a decade. Tens of thousands of lives were lost. Even more than that were tortured or injured. It was a massive conflict, horrific, but even in El Salvador, it isn't necessarily widely known about, or spoken about. I imagine for those who survived it, it's traumatic to revisit those memories. And for the younger generations, it hopefully feels far removed from their lives. Hopefully, they live more peaceful lives.

But as the film reminds us, these stories are important. These memories are important. They always say, those who ignore history are doomed to repeat it. We see this come to fruition time and time again. So Remember Us looks back at those terrible years to do its part in keeping this history alive, honoring the lives that were lost, and hopefully helping to prevent similar wars from happening again.

The film has a straightforward animation style. The characters are drawn with clear lines, bright colors, expressive but not needlessly complicated in their depiction. The backgrounds are a bit busier, a bit more stylized. There are moments when the backgrounds take on a mosaic-type look, like you're looking at massive tile artworks. These are some of the film's most engaging and poignant moments, really nice pops of extra stylistic oomph.

I think the visual approach is smart, because it is serving as a delivery device for the words. The film follows a journalist who is interviewing survivors of the war, so there's more dialogue here than in a lot of shorts, which often like to skew as silent as possible for various reasons. Leon's script is sharp, to-the-point, not shying away from the horrors of war, taking them head-on. A lot of the stories will feel familiar, because sadly, a lot of them are the sort of things that have happened in many wars, and will continue to happen. Over the course of the three stories, each with a unique perspective, the breadth of the loss becomes clearer, starker, heavier. First, we hear from a woman who has a memory of seeing large-scale death as a child. Then, another woman who became a leader in the resistance. Finally, from a man who lost his daughter, and feels he still hasn't properly mourned her, because he doesn't know where her remains are.

It's heavy stuff, to be sure, but Leon handles it with such respect, and with a clarity of vision, that there's something hopeful about hearing these stories and watching this film. It has a noble cause at heart, and hopefully will help any viewers who experienced these things firsthand to feel seen, heard, and supported.