Latin American Video Archive - Home
Puerto Rico
A Panorama of titles from Puerto Rico


November 1999



Sign up here to receive our free, monthly Featured Titles newsletter
Click here to remove yourself from our mailing list if you're already a subscriber.

Documentaries


Culebra: The Beginning   Get Details and Purchasing Info
Diego de la Texera
Documentary   30 minutes   1971
With English subtitles

Culebra, little island paradise, northeast of Puerto Rico, becomes hell, as the US NAVY insists in using its beautiful beaches as targets for their ship to shore practice. An unexploded bomb explodes in the faces of two boys playing on one of the beaches beyond the target area of Flamingo Beach. The Culebrans organize themselves -- with the help of Puerto Rican pro-independence activists -- and invade the target areas to stop the US ships from firing or be killed. The breaking news hit the US networks and a group of American Quakers fly down, join in and build a Chapel -- together with the Culebrans -- in the Flamingo Beach target area in defiance of Federal authorities. They are arrested by Federal Marshalls. But they go with risen fists and pride, for they now know that the struggle has started and that this film is just a part of the beginning: el comienzo
Purchase Price: $ 150.00


Battle of Vieques, The   Get Details and Purchasing Info
Zynida Nazario
Documentary   40 minutes   1986
With English subtitles

This film provides an historical overview of the Puerto Rican island of Vieques, and the sociopolitical and economic repercussions of the presence of the U.S. Navy base on a majorportion of the island. It presents the resistance of the people of Vieques, particularly the fishermen, to the navy's bomb-dropping target practice operations on the island.
Purchase Price: $ 295.00


Puerto Rico: Paradise Invaded   Get Details and Purchasing Info
Alfonso Beato
Documentary   30 minutes   1977
With English subtitles

Examines the history and present-day reality of Puerto Rico, including the history and the contemporary relationship between the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico and the U.S.; the impact of industrialization on the island's economy, ecology and social life; economic exile and life in New York City; and the history of the Puerto Rican independence movement.
Purchase Price: $ 250.00


Puerto Rico:a Colony The American Way   Get Details and Purchasing Info
Diego Echeverria
Documentary   27 minutes   1982
With English subtitles

Examines the island's relationship with the U.S. including the economic crisis.
Purchase Price: $ 250.00


Si o No? Puerto Rico And The Statehood Question   Get Details and Purchasing Info
Sally Dubrowsky
Documentary   28 minutes   1992
With English subtitles

Puerto Rico's quest for statehood and its impact on the US are the topic of this title. This video explores the history of the past century with respect to Puerto Rico and Puerto Ricans, both on the island and on the Mainland.
Purchase Price: $ 79.95


My Puerto Rico   Get Details and Purchasing Info
Sharon Simon & Raquel Ortiz
Documentary   90 minutes   1996
With English subtitles

A personal journey through Puerto Rico's rich cultural traditions, revealing the remarkable stories of its revolutionaries and abolitionists, poets, and politicians, whose struggle for national identity unfolds within the dramatic history of relations between the US and Puerto Rico.
Purchase Price: $ 225.00


Story of Operation Bootstrap, the   Get Details and Purchasing Info
Pedro Rivera and Susan Zeig
Documentary   59 minutes   1986
With English subtitles

Examines Puerto Rico's Operation Bootstrap, the highly vaunted U.S. economic development plan of the 1950's to provide a role-model for economic development throughout Latin America. Using newsreels, rare archival photos and footage, numerous interviews, and exerpts from government propaganda films, it examines the historical background to Operation Bootstrap, from the 1930's through the rise to power of Luiz Munoz Marin and the Popular Democratic Party in the 1940's, to the '60's when U.S. officials proudly displayed Puerto Rico as the showcase of the Americas.
Purchase Price: $ 195.00


El Legado: A Puerto Rican Legacy   Get Details and Purchasing Info
Diego Echeverria
Documentary   30 minutes   1981
With English subtitles

Traces the growth of the Puerto Rican community in NYC in the first half of this century by blending together historical film footage of the era and personal interviews with pioneer migrants.
Purchase Price: $ 99.95


Nationalists, The   Get Details and Purchasing Info
Jose Garcia Torres
Documentary   28 minutes   1973
With English subtitles

THE NATIONALISTS surveys the activities of the Puerto Rican Nationalist Party in the 1950's including the background to the shooting incident in the U.S. Congress by four Puerto Rican nationalists in March 1954, and the contributions of the movement's leading figure, Don PedroAlbizu Campos.
Purchase Price: $ 250.00



Feature Films


gran fiesta, La   Get Details
Marcos Zurinaga
Feature   100 minutes   1986
No English subtitles

During 1942 there is a grand ball held at the most exclusive club on the island of Puerto Rico. During the party amorous and political intrigues develop that closely paralell the life of the island.


Heroes Without a Cause   Get Details
Ivan Dariel Ortiz
Feature   90 minutes   1998
With English subtitles

The United States intervened in the conflict within North Vietnam and South Vietnam. In this confrontation 48,000 Puerto Ricans participated. Little has been said about these soldiers. This movie examines the participation and the dignity with wich these soldiers fought.


Guagua Aerea, La   Get Details
Luis Molina Casanova
feature   100 minutes   1993
No English subtitles

La Guagua Aerea ia a tragic-comedy in which the main character, a Puerto Rican immigrant, is able to laugh at himself even in times of adversity. His struggle to survive is endless and has become as routine as his trips back and forth between San Juan and New York.


Dios los cria   Get Details
Jacobo Morales
Feature   120 minutes   1980
No English subtitles

Five stories that discover the avarice and hypocricy of ceratin sectors in the contemporary Puerto Rican society, as a result the people denounce the false morals of the burgeoisie.


What Happened to Santiago   Get Details
Jacobo Morales
Feature   105 minutes   1989
No English subtitles

Santiago Rodiguez has been an accountant for forty years. Although he is a good, simple man he is burdened with hardships of life such as, his wife's death, conflicts with his children's insecure situation, and with the materialism which rules his country.When he turns sixtyfive his despair grows, he is asked to retire from his job which he worked at since he was a young man.One day during one of his walks through the park he finds a young, enigmatic woman. They establish a relationship which helps restore Santiago's enthusiasm to live. But Angelina avoids speaking of her past.Santiago hires an investigator to discover the reason for Angelina's silence. The result of the investigation depresses Santiago and forces him to make a difficult decision.


Nicolas and the Others   Get Details
Jacobo Morales
Feature   102 minutes   1985
No English subtitles

Friends casually find each other after twenty years have gone by. A satirical comedy with nostalgic elements. Characters and situations form part of what Puerto Rico is, like in other societies where material goods and lucrative way of living are the guidelines.





Other Featured Titles