My relationship with Puerto Rican cinema is, in one word, complicated. Born and raised on the archipelago (but colonized in my way of thinking), I used to run away at the mere mention of Boricua movies – thinking only American or foreign-made ones could be good. Then, I studied film for two years in La Universidad del Sagrado Corazón in San Juan, Puerto Rico. Not because I wanted to write and create Puerto Rican movies, but because it was a stepping stone for something larger later on. My dream was always to leave and write (and create) in the United States and in English. That’s what I wanted… until I left, and then, I didn’t want to leave at all. That’s why Esta Isla affected me so much.
Esta Isla premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival 2025 in the US Narrative Competition category this past weekend. It’s a coming-of-age tale about two teenagers, Bebo (Zion Ortíz) and Lola (Fabiola Brown), who run away into the depths of Puerto Rico’s mountains after a grieving loss and its violent consequences. It’s the narrative feature debut of its two Emmy-award-winning directors Lorraine Jones Molina and Cristian Carretero and it was a huge feat that took a decade to complete, between jobs, workshops, grants, devastating natural disasters, and a pandemic.
“It started because, obviously, we love films and we adore this type of film – this genre of lovers-on-the-run, coming-of-age. We had movies that we felt inspired by, like Badlands, Bonnie and Clyde, and Y Tu Mamá También,” Molina told Latina Media Co. “Through this type of story, there can be another layer where we can see and talk about other things, as well. We can see Puerto Rico, see the culture. As [the characters] get to know each other and themselves, they also get to know who we are as Puerto Ricans, as human beings, and connect.”
While I don’t disagree that Esta Isla is a lovers-on-the-run film, my mind immediately compared it to something more familiar to me: Greek myth and Shakespeare. There are elements of Romeo and Juliet here: Bebo’s coastal life, deep poverty, a family that’s trying to get by, and violent run-ins with drugs and the men taking advantage of it. Lola’s privileged luxury, private school, and party drugs, all alone in her giant desolate mansion except for her rapist of a step-father. The story also reminds me of Orpheus and Eurydice, although there’s nothing specific in the plot that parallels the myth, like with Romeo and Juliet. It’s more of a feeling. This film and its theme of endless cycles feels mythic.
As the plot unfolds in the first few minutes of the film, I started to get nervous. Will this be yet another Puerto Rican film about men and their drugs and violence? But just when you think you know what to expect, Esta Isla shows its true colors, and most of all, its intention, refusing to treat those elements as merely a plot device. By the end, even the ‘villain’ isn’t some evil caricature. They’re complex and real. “When we had an idea, we would go to the caserio. We’d talk to them. And sometimes, they would tell us a story that was like, wow. And so it’s based on reality, it’s all there, if you look closely and you’re attentive,” Carretero said. “That’s why it doesn’t feel so stereotypical, even though there are so many films on that subject. These are real people, and this is part of their context. And we try to tell [their stories] not from the outside looking in, but from the inside looking out.”
What makes Esta Isla so elevated isn’t its framing, editing, or acting (although those are all also excellent), it’s the score and sound. Composed by Alain Emile with sound design by Johannes Peters, I genuinely cannot stop thinking about the audio in this film. It’s the very first thing I noticed, with the crisp sounds of the waves crashing, fire crackling, and a crescendoing microphone feedback loop interspersed that gives the entire normally ordinary sequence, a tense uncomfortable feeling. Instantly, these noises put you on the edge of your seat, as if saying, “There’s something wrong here” with no images to really match that tension. That feeling, even when we reach our violent climax, still follows. We’re left expecting worse situations, to match the score. That might sound like a negative thing, but in my opinion, the score isn’t necessarily meant to go with our visuals. It’s meant to portray our characters’ emotions and their paranoid thoughts.
A character that really struck me was Cora (Teófilo Torres), the farmer in the mountains who offers our young couple aid, safety, and honest work. At first, he’s a mysterious older figure that Bebo and Lola (and us) are distrustful of, but later, he becomes almost like a father. After a particularly tense scene where he wordlessly caresses and then kills a rooster, he tells Bebo he hid in a cave once for three weeks and that Tainos believed caves were the threshold between the real world and the spiritual one. He says they used to fight for something different on this island. When I first saw this scene, I thought his lines were a reference to Plato’s allegory of the cave, carrying a message about truth, ignorance, and how colonialism has made us all unwilling perpetrators of its violence. But it’s also, clearly, a reference to El Pozo de Jacinto. The legend talks about a jíbaro who was always tied to his favorite cow, and when the cow walked too close to the hole overlooking the ocean and fell, Jacinto fell with it. Cora represents the forgotten jíbaro archetype. I don’t have concrete answers on how to interpret his story, his ending, or how he connects with our other characters, but I can say that I haven’t stopped thinking about it — which is how I know I’ve fallen in love with a story.
The script was co-written by the directors and Kisha Tikina Burgos, from Under My Nails (2012) and Antes que Cante el Gallo (2016) fame. When I found out about the latter, everything clicked in my head. The latter film came out in theaters when I was still at Sagrado, before Hurricane Maria happened, and I was forced to leave my entire life behind. It was the first time I remember being in awe of a Puerto Rican-made film. Before that, I didn’t think it was possible to create something so Puerto Rican and still so beautiful and so good. It touched me in such a deep creative place in my heart. That might sound silly, but it’s true. And as an adult who knows better, who sees the value in myself and my island, Esta Isla touches that place too. It’s bigger than itself.
Esta Isla has one last showing at the Tribeca Film Festival, Saturday June 14.
