Minneapolis has become a battlefield: clouds of poisonous green billow over the wintry streets, there are wounded people, screams, vehicles that resemble tanks. Laura Poitras and Rachel Lauren Mueller capture the work of the immigration authority ICE and its paramilitary operations from different perspectives and combine them into a horror film. Parts of the population organise themselves in order to stand up against and protocol the illegal actions of the perpetrators, most them in masks. Gradually, a network of gigantic dimension is revealed, which extends to the kidnapping of minors, secret scouting trips and a steady stream of deportation flights. “They’re Here” is a genre-fluid documentary dystopia, whose darkness is only heightened by the score by Alessandro Cortini (Nine Inch Nails).

Carolin Weidner