Blood has flowed through the island of Hispaniola’s Massacre River, a border waterway also known as the Dajabón River.

It got its name during the colonial struggle between the Spanish and the French, and it was the infamous site of the 1937 Parley Massacre, which defined relations between the Dominican Republic and Haiti.

In 2018, the river gave Haitian farmers hope when Haitian President Jovenel Moïse launched the construction of a canal near the border towns of Dajabón and Ouanaminthe.

In 2021, Haitian workers reported they were the victims of Dominican soldiers’ intimidation, and Moïse was killed. As the water dispute continued, Dominican President Luis Abinader closed the border in 2023.

“The Heroes of the Massacre River,” a documentary, follows the brave volunteers who didn’t give up on the irrigation canal to use water from the river to revive the Maribahoux plain.

Bertrhude Albert, the Haitian-American winner of the 2021-2022 UNESCO-Hamdan Prize for Excellence in Teacher Development and co-founder of nonprofit P4H Global, raised funds in support of the canal. Before a showing of “The Heroes of the Massacre River” on Thursday night at the Little Haiti Cultural Complex in Miami’s Little Haiti neighborhood, Albert described the documentary as groundbreaking.“It captures one of the most important moments in modern Haitian history,” Albert said.

Samuel Dameus, a Haitian filmmaker born in Cap-Haitien, captured the determination behind the Ouanaminthe canal project, a farmer-led effort that included boycotting the Dominican Republic.

Albert said the documentary shows how “a movement” that included Haitians with different religious and socio-economic backgrounds supported the project.

“It’s a powerful film that captures the might, the power, of the Haitian people,” Albert said.

Dameus, of BOYO Films, chose to use an original soundtrack in an ode to Haitian culture. In some scenes, the music captures how the project’s delays triggered historic memories of past trauma.

“A lot of bodies were thrown in the rivers,” Albert said about the 1937 massacre of Haitian migrants at the hands of the Dominican military.

Dameus also recorded how religious leaders visited the construction site to help support the volunteers, and he included a scene with practitioners of Vodou, a religion with roots in African slavery.

Albert said the canal proved successful, and it has not only “revolutionized” agriculture in the Maribahoux plain, but it has also developed new opportunities that need more investment.

“Since last year, it has decreased the price of rice by 33% in the region,” Albert said. “It has more than doubled the amount of farmers.”

The documentary, Albert said, shows that change is possible when people come together.

Haitian filmmaker documents Ouanaminthe canal in ‘The Heroes of the Massacre River’

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Magdala Louissaint

Andrea Torres