In the world of entertainment, the word Latina often brings to mind actresses such as Jennifer López, Salma Hayek and Cameron Díaz. However, Latinas are now experiencing a pivotal shift from existing primarily in front of the camera as actresses to taking the reins behind the camera as writers, producers and directors. Perhaps one of the best-known examples of this shift is Salma Hayek’s uphill struggle and hardwon success in bringing the life of Frida Kahlo to the big screen. However, there are also numerous unsung heroes who, with steely determination and an undaunted spirit, forge ahead with their own filmmaking dreams.

These emerging Latina filmmakers can now control how the nuances, subtleties and complexities of the Latino culture are parlayed to a worldwide audience. This important transference of power can also help shape, in great degree, the ways in which our culture is understood by the mainstream American audience. “I call myself a kind of a drawbridge that drops down, that allows other people to cross into our culture and see pieces of themselves reflected in our stories,” says Susana Tubert, writer and director of the short film Gypsy Girl.

This new breed of filmmakers draws on a long-standing tradition of storytelling that weaves them together as women, as Latinas, and as the curators of our culture. “The women in the culture are really like the foundation, I think, for the whole culture. They’re so strong and so giving, and it’s just something that’s unappreciated,” states Rum and Coke director María Escobedo, whose one hour film entitled La Cocina was
shown on PBS.

The filmmakers we spoke to stressed time and time again the deep sense of responsibility they felt in telling the stories of the Latino culture with honesty and of not being afraid to challenge tradition while simultaneously respecting it. A primary reason for the intensity of emotion with which these filmmakers have made their films has been an overriding frustration with the depiction of Latinas offered by Hollywood. Often in film, Latinas are only seen in the roles of the maids, prostitutes or the brazen sexpot.

Escobedo states, “The Latina voice is just one that I just don’t think is being heard at all, and when it is, it’s so stereotypical because it is usually written by men.” This sentiment is echoed by writer, director and producer Cyn Cañel Rossi, the only Latina at the 2003 Sundance Film Festival with her film Rhythm of the Saints, a film also chosen as the closing night film at the 2003 New York International Latino Film Festival, a first-time feat for a Latina filmmaker. “We’ve been caricatures for so long now … not until they allow us to tell our own stories can we be truly represented in Hollywood. We should be mainstream, based on the population of Latinos in the U.S. — we should not be a sidebar.”

Karen Torres, the first New York Puerto Rican to write, produce and direct her own film, namely 1996’s Pleasant Dreams, believes strongly in the value of fully understanding how Latinos are perceived, stereotypes and all. “Stereotypes serve a purpose because, in the big picture, if only to defy them, not only is it important to know what you are—it’s also important to know what you’re not.”

Despite the daunting obstacles facing Latina filmmakers, the consensus among these filmmakers is that the need to be accurately portrayed is of such an urgent nature that it can no longer wait to be addressed from outside the culture. There is now a deeply rooted sense within the Latina filmmaking community that true integration into the mainstream consciousness will not occur until Latinos themselves direct that integration. They express dissatisfaction at the cyclical waves of the U.S.’s “discovery” of the Latino community, of a constant sense of being just on the brink of being understood and embraced completely within the mainstream American audience. As Tubert states, “We can’t sit back and wait to be ‘discovered,’ I think we have to push the envelope by continuing to find alternative ways of creating our work. There’s been too many waves. Latino this, Latina that. It’s time for us to claim our own waves.” Tricia Creason Valencia of Flaca Films and the director of We Got Next feels that “because of things like financial limitations, a lot of us are doing independent filmmaking. The more accessible filmmaking becomes, the more our stories are gonna get out there. What we also need are more Latinas siting down and writing these stories so that directors like myself can take their work and bring it to the screen.”

Her statement highlights the lack of Latino-written screenplays, which explains why so many Latina filmmakers are hyphenated writer-directors. Latina filmmakers state that there is a real dearth in accessibility to authentic screenplays that they can turn into films, and they feel strongly about the need to establish a volume of Latino created work that directors can draw from. Screenwriting companies such as Two Oceans Productions are helping to fill that void, but there is still a need to see their numbers increase.

Calixto Chinchilla, founder and director of the New York International Latino Film festival has seen firsthand how the Latina voice has emerged. In last year’s film festival, Latina films accounted for close to 50 percent of the films shown and, for the first time in its history, a Latina-directed film was chosen as the closing night film. “We’re in a time of transition and development; slowly but surely Latinas are becoming a strong force. We are seeing movements develop within a movement,” says Chinchilla. Cañel Rossi states, “I think I am just sort of trying to continue that push, to be part of that movement. I do believe that right now there is a movement among Latino writers, directors and producers.” At the forefront of this emerging Latina movement is Elisha Miranda, director, writer, producer and co-founder of Chica Luna Productions, whose mission in creating Chica Luna was to organize a collective of women of color filmmakers. Their objectives are to foster the necessary support and resources needed to empower women of color to create films and help foster an understanding of the impact that media images have on individuals and their communities. “I worry about my patria for the next generation. I’ve seen my people struggle, and I want to create a better vision for them. I want us to grow up and be proud. I want us to be able to dream.”

For the filmmakers, another important desire in their work is to show that Latino films are, in fact, films of a universal nature told within a Latino context. As Tubert states, “People gravitate to the arts because you’re searching for your roots or because you’re searching to belong.” To date, most Latino films made by non-Latinos have played up the exoticness of the culture, the otherness, and what they have been missing is an intrinsic understanding that Latinos should be an integral part of the culture, that they should be the norm, not the exception. Latino films carry within them the full range of human experience, and because of that, their relevance is not restricted solely to the community from which they emerge.

Latina filmmakers understand that their ongoing effort to bring their films to the American mainstream audience is one that will not happen overnight. Torres, a trailblazer within the Latina filmmaking community with Pleasant Dreams, expresses surprise in looking back and realizing that more Latinas have not been able to follow in her path. “Actually, when I made my film I’d thought there’d be a lot of people behind me making a lot of films, but there’s not as much as I’d thought.” However steep the struggle, Latina filmmakers nonetheless continue to take on the responsibility of representing their culture in the most accurate and qualitative level. Their moments of courage and determination are oftentimes in response to the internal challenges of being a Latina filmmaker as Karen Torres illustrates when speaking of her first day on location as a director. “I really didn’t believe I was going to do it until I was actually standing on the set and said ‘action,’ which by the way, I was shy to say it.”

At other times it is the external limitations of funding, accessibility, opportunity and support that they must overcome in order to make their respective films. Despite it all, however, they continue to move forward and open their own doors of opportunities. “You know you are stronger than whatever this one predicament you’re in and you know you can overcome this,” says Escobedo. These women continue to overcome challenges and, in doing so, they pave the way for a new generation of Latina filmmakers while shining a light on our culture. As Creason Valencia’s film title suggests, in the world of Latino filmmaking, it is the women’s turn and “We Got Next.”