Call Center BluesCall Center Blues

The film begins with the ringing of a phone, resembling that of a racing heartbeat in an emergency room. This is a call center. Without any explanation, the film follows the daily lives of four call center workers. However, the focal point of the film aren’t the people, but the spaces that are introduced following them. It is the American city of San Diego and the Mexican city of Tijuana, that face each other across the American-Mexican border. The story of the film gradually transitions from the lives of the four people living near the borderlands of US and Mexico and speak English without any Mexican accents to a story of living at the margins of national borders. The film uncovers the meaning of national borders and boundaries through the livesof people who chose or had no choice but to live in Tijuana. Instead of explaining, the film shows how manmade boundaries can shape human lives. The film captures the inner burden of life in the US they carry while they try to rebuild a new life in Tijuana. It also highlights the lives on the boundaries, or the regrets, hopes, fears, anxieties, and even the blooming of love and trust of the people whose lives were forced to the boundaries. (LEE Seungmin)