Film Subjects

Select Subject and click GO

Puerto Rican Studies & Puerto Rican Diaspora

Black and Blue
Hugh King & Lamar Williams
1987, 58 min., Color, US
A powerful mix of archival material, news clips and documentary footage chronicles impassioned community response to decades of deadly force against people of color by members of the Philadelphia poli...

Break and Enter a.k.a. Squatters (Newsreel #62)
Newsreel
Producer: Newsreel
1971, 42 min., BW, US
This film captures the militant antecedents to today's housing reclamation movement in New York City. In 1970, several hundred Puerto Rican and Dominican families reclaimed housing left vacant by the ...

Can't Jail the Revolution and Break the Walls Down
Kenyatta Tyehimba & Ada Gay Griffin
Producer: Third World Newsreel
1991, 60 min., Color, US
These two 30 minute videos use footage compiled from over 40 social justice media productions to chronicle the perspectives of political prisoners and of war within the United States. Historical foot...

The Case Against Lincoln Center (Newsreel #17)
Newsreel
Producer: NEWSREEL
1968, 12 min., BW, US
More than 20,000 Latino families were displaced to make way for Lincoln Center, home to the Metropolitan Opera and the New York Symphony. This film examines the patrons of art" complex (corporation...

Community Control (Newsreel #24)
Newsreel
Producer: Newsreel
1969, 38 min., BW, US
This film documents one of the most important struggles for education in the sixties. In 1968, under intensive community pressure from Black and Latino communities, the State of New York chose three N...

Drills of Liberation
Juan C Dávila Santiago
Producer: Juan C. Dávila Santiago
2021, 121 min., Color, Puerto Rico
"Liberation Drills" is the untold story of the Puerto Rican protest wave of 2016-2019, which culminated with the resignation of governor Ricardo Rosselló. In 2016, the US Congress appointed a seven-me...

Harvest of Empire: The Untold Story of Latinos in America
Eduardo López & Peter Getzels
Producer: Wendy Thompson-Marquez
2012, 90 min., Color, US
At a time of heated and divisive debate over immigration, HARVEST OF EMPIRE examines the direct connection between the long history of U.S. intervention in Latin America and the immigration crisis we ...

La Historia de Jonas
Luisa Sanchez
1992, 5 min., Color, US
Using a collage of urban scenes and voice over narration, this 5 minute video explores the feelings and issues faced by a new Puerto Rican immigrant to New York City in his own words. Available in Sp...

La Bruja: A Witch from the Bronx
Felix Rodriguez
2005, 50 min., Color, US
Art, labor and family blend in this intimate documentary about performance artist Caridad De La Luz, better known as 'La Bruja'. Born and raised in the Bronx, this daughter of Puerto Rican immigrants ...

Latino Poets Speakout
Renata Gangemi & Ruben Gonzalez
Producer: Third World Newsreel
2005, 10 min., Color, US
Three shorts featuring performances by some of New York City's vanguard Latino poets: KILLKILLKILL by Jesus Papoleto Melendez (5 Min) GOD BLESS AMERICA by Mariposa (2 min), and TAMALES IN JA...

Lincoln Hospital (Newsreel #35)
Newsreel
Producer: Newsreel
1970, 11 min., BW, US
When a city-run health clinic in the South Bronx fails to meet the needs of the city, local residents and health workers force a strike and then run the clinic themselves....

Living Along the Fenceline
Lina Hoshino & Gwyn Kirk
Producer: Lina Hoshino, Gwyn Kirk & Deborah Lee
2012, 65 min., Color, US
LIVING ALONG THE FENCELINE tells the stories of seven grassroots women leaders from across the Pacific to Puerto Rico whose communities are affected by the U.S. military presence in their backyards. A...

Making the Impossible Possible
Tami Gold & Pam Sporn
Producer: Gisely Colón López, Tami Gold & Pam Sporn
2021, 33 min., Color/BW, US
MAKING THE IMPOSSIBLE POSSIBLE tells the story of the student-led struggle to win Puerto Rican Studies at Brooklyn College, CUNY, in the late 1960s. The documentary is a mosaic of voices, film footage...

Musica
Gustavo Paredes
1985, 59 min., Color, US
This film is an odyssey through the eyes, words and music of individuals who pioneered Afro-Cuban music in the United States. The video offers a rich overview of a wide number of musical styles from ...

Nuyorican Básquet
Julio César Torres González & Ricardo Olivero Lora
Producer: Freddie Marrero
2017, Color, Puerto Rico
Nuyorican Básquet chronicles the dramatic story of the Puerto Rican national basketball team’s participation in the 1979 Pan American Games. Boasting a totally unique approach to the game, the Puer...

Palante, Siempre Palante!
Iris Morales
1996, 48 min., Color, US
In the midst of the African American civil rights struggle, protests to end the Vietnam War and the women's movement for equality, Puerto Rican and Latino communities fought for economic and social ju...

Percussion, Impressions and Reality
Allan Siegel
Producer: Third World Newsreel
1978, 30 min., Color, US
This is the first comprehensive U.S. film to explore the origins and growth of traditional Puerto Rican music. Interviews with musicians living in New York reveal how traditional music is used as a so...

El Pueblo se Levanta (Newsreel #63)
Newsreel
Producer: Newsreel
1971, 42 min., BW, US
In the late '60s, conditions for Puerto Ricans in the US reached the boiling point. Faced with racial discrimination, deficient community services, and poor education and job opportunities, Puerto Ric...

El Puente
Sara Echaniz & Maria Christina Villaseñor
Producer: Third World Newsreel Workshop
2000, 13 min., Color, US
A short documentary about the first accredited high school for peace and justice, the El Puente Academy is located in a predominantly Puerto Rican neighborhood in Brooklyn. A case study of how indivi...

Salty Dog Blues
Al Santana & Denise B Santiago
2012, 52 min., Color/BW, US
SALTY DOG BLUES features a group of men and women of color who served in the United States Merchant Marine from 1937 – 1989. This nine-year project examines their development as a multi-racial and int...

Samuel Lind's Coastal World
Sonia Fritz
Producer: Frances Lausell
2006, 24 min., Color, Puerto Rico
This documentary captures the colors, music and culture that inspire the art of Samuel Lind, an Afro-Puerto Rican painter, graphic artist and sculptor. Originally from Loiza, Puerto Rico, Lind celebra...

Shaman Llego
Frank Perez
Producer: Third World Newsreel Workshop
1992, 17 min., Color, US
This documentary profiles the "Shaman Repertory Theatre", a community oriented group based in Spanish Harlem. Through sketches from performances and interviews with troupe members, this piece illustra...

Stand-By Generation, The
Juan Carlos Davila
2016, 20 min., Color, Puerto Rico
Shot in Puerto Rico, THE STAND-BY GENERATION explores the challenges of young workers seeking secure and stable jobs. The majority of the jobs offered to the new generation of workers in Puerto Rico a...

Teach Our Children
Christine Choy & Susan Robeson
Producer: Third World Newsreel
1972, 35 min., BW, US
This film focuses on the historic 1971 Attica prison rebellion in upstate New York. It targets the conditions that caused prisoners to take drastic steps toward securing their basic rights. The film...

Vieques: An Endless Battle
Juan C Dávila
2016, 68 min., Color, Puerto Rico
For more than sixty years the United States Navy used the island of Vieques, Puerto Rico, to test military weaponry and to train soldiers. Decades of opposition from the local community and internatio...

Voces de Fillmore
Ariana Allensworth, Teresa Basilio & Regina Eaton
Producer: Third World Newsreel Workshop
2015, 19 min., Color, US
This documentary traces the memories and experiences of families living on one block located in South Williamsburg, a Brooklyn neighborhood that is affectionately known by long time residents as South...


Call Us 1 (212) 947-9277
  • Third World Newsreel
  • • 545 Eighth Avenue, Suite 550, New York, NY 10018
  • • Telephone 212-947-9277

TWN acknowledges that in New York we are on the unceded territory of the Lenni Lenape, Canarsie, Shinecock, and Munsee peoples and challenges the harm that continues to be inflicted upon Indigenous and People of Color communities here and abroad, which is why we all need to be part of the struggle for rights, equality and justice.

TWN is supported in part by the National Endowment for the Arts, New York State Council on the Arts, New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, Color Congress, MOSAIC, New York Community Trust, Peace Development Fund, Ford Foundation, Golden Globe Foundation, Kolibri Foundation and individual donors.