The OxcartLA CARRETA / THE OXCART
Directed by José Garcia / Written by René Marqués
(Spanish,English subtitles), Color, 16mm, 27 min, 1970
<div align="center">This page requires a web browser that can display objects. We recommend <i>Netscape Navigator</i>. The first act of the play by the renowned Puerto Rican playwright René Marqués is adapted for the PBS television series Realidades, the first Latino series produced by public television. The family of don Chago awaits the arrival of an oxcart that will take them to the capital. While they prepare to leave, the elderly jibaro admonishes his daughter doña Gabriela and grandson Luis that the land is where they belong. But Luis already has plans to work in a factory. Through poignant exchanges, a slice of Puerto Rican history is revealed: The displacement of the jibaro by American agribusiness and his voluntary exile to the big cities of Puerto Rico and, ultimately, New York in search of work. The final sequences strikingly contrast the family entering a New York City tenement with their departure from una casita del campo in Puerto Rico.
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