In the documentary film, Backside, director/ filmmaker Raúl O. Paz-Pastrana (Border South), has lovingly composed a poetic meditation about the immigrant workers who care, feed, and tend to the million-dollar race horses at the Kentucky Derby racetrack.
Because of its historical association with royalty and nobility, horse racing is often called “the sport of kings.”In the horse racing caste system at the top are the horses, jockeys, owners, and gamblers, followed by the trainers, and beneath them, the workers who work for the trainers.
Pastrana skillfully uses a minimalist, cinema vertité approach to his film to imbue the workers with an aura of grace and nobility of their own.
There is no celebrity narrative voice over or mood setting, ethnically tinged music with a guitar or piano. There are no long-winded testimonials detailing aspects of the story.
Instead, Pastrana slowly lets the story, with virtually no dialog, pictorially unfold and reveal itself naturally by observing the workers going through their daily routine in quiet elegance. Often, the scenes that show the workers doing their jobs are framed and composed in a painterly fashion that evokes Van Gogh’s representations of working-class people in his timeless and iconic artwork.
The deep emotional attachment depicted in the film between horse and worker is one of the more touching and effective storylines of the film. In one scene, a curious wife asks her husband why he gives the horse candy.
“Because he’s my friend,” he whispers to his wife.
In the opening scene, we watch as a horse is being taken onto a ramp from a trailer. In the final scene, the horse is led up a ramp into a trailer to travel south. The scenes act seamlessly as cinematic bookends for the whole documentary.
Pastrana, a Mexican immigrant from Chihuahua, Mexico, now living in Denver, Colorado, is intimately knowledgeable about the immigrant experience in America and the untold value immigrants bring to the U.S. economy. In this unfortunate era of ICE raids and a Mass Deportation agenda, Backside is a gentle but persuasive reminder of the important and often unknown contributions of the immigrant community to America.
The Kentucky Derby Race is often described as the most exciting two minutes in sports.” Pastrana’s moving documentary, Backside, shows us the thousands of hard-working, tireless, dedicated hours that go into making those “two exciting minutes.”Backside premieres on PBS, Monday, April 13. Check your local listing for times.
Independent Lens: Backside (2026) can be watched primarily on PBS.org and Free PBS App . It is also available for on-demand streaming for PBS Passport members and will have broadcast airings on various local PBS stations and the World Channel.