Daniel DeVivo

DeVivo believes that films are a powerful resource for popular education and cross-cultural exchange. Over the past decade, he has made films that put a human face on the tragic failures of U.S. immigration policy.

Two Americans is DeVivo's latest effort. This character-driven documentary pits the political marksmanship of a powerful elected official, Sheriff Joe Arpaio, against the livelihood of a 9-year-old girl whose parents are arrested in one of the Sheriff's workplace raids. Co-Directed by Valeria Fernández, Two Americans mirrors the concerns of no less than 11 million unauthorized immigrants living in the U.S. today and exposes the politics that keeps them in the shadows of our society.

DeVivo's earlier work, Crossing Arizona, triggers complicated feelings about human rights, culture, class, labor and national security by showing how U.S. policy has pushed illegal immigration into the most treacherous tracts of desert along the U.S./Mexico border and claimed the lives of more than six thousand people. In documenting the gamut of local responses, which range from humanitarian aid to vigilantism, Crossing Arizona paints a vivid picture of how macro-economic, political, and social forces play out on the smaller stage of a local community. An ensemble cast of characters, extremely passionate in their beliefs, makes this film ideal viewing for audiences with diverse or undecided viewpoints. Co-Directed by Joseph Mathew, Crossing Arizona was an official selection of the Sundance Film Festival and recipient of the CINE Masters Series Award for excellence in documentary filmmaking.

DeVivo graduated from Harvard with a B.A. in Social Anthropology. A 2011 Fulbright Fellow, he had the opportunity to work alongside film and media professionals in Middle East at the onset of the Arab Spring.