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If you don’t know who Ricardo Mendez Matta and Poli Marichal are by now, you will once you see Ladrones y Mentirosos (Thieves and Liars), a gritty look at Puerto Rico high on drugs: Think Syriana meets The Sopranos meets Traffic, La Charca and Les Miserables–abridged of course–set on a Caribbean island, with blockbuster appeal.

When the Puerto Rican Film Commission announced that it was accepting submissions for its Film Industry Fund–created in 2001 with the intention of promoting film production on the island—Matta and Marichal were eventually awarded $1.3 million–the largest ever awarded. That is hardly surprising, given the work this husband-and-wife team have done so far.

But it is surprising that the Puerto Rican government would help bring this film to life, given that the government is counted among its bad guys. In this fictionalized drama about three Puerto Rican families, culled from real-life and the daily news, Matta and Marichal have plenty to say about the drug trade and the systemic corruption that has developed on the island in the past twenty years.

I caught up with Matta and Marichal during the recent New York International Latino Film Festival to talk about Ladrones y Mentirosos.

Where did you get the motivation for the film? Matta:

If you were to ask any Puerto Rican what they thought about this, everybody would tell you about one person or more in their lives who is or has been in the drug industry or affected by it. We’ve all seen a great deal of change in the past twenty years. It’s of the same sort you’d see in every other place affected by drugs. But unlike those places, Puerto Rico has a second problem, similar to what happens in Juarez, Mexico…Puerto Rico is used as a thruway for traffic to be sent on its way north.

This underground economy has changed lives. Middle-class families can’t afford to live there anymore. Before, everyone had humble cars; now you’ll see young guys driving Hummers. Even though things like this make it seem so obvious, even with lots of evidence, money-laundering charges, the arresting of corrupt police and documentation–which underscores the fact that this is not a secret–something about the nature of the industry cultivates an air of denial, no collective consciousness.

How did it get so bad? Marichal:

Under Clinton, legislation changed from transit-zone interdiction to source-country efforts, which meant that it became that much easier to overlook what was happening in Puerto Rico. Whenever you hear about drugs or the corruption that comes along with it, we focus on Colombia when, truth be told, the same thing is happening right underneath the American flag. This, even though, Puerto Rico has FBI and DEA offices that thirty states don’t have. What also makes it so easy is that Puerto Rico is surrounded by water. The dealers have droves of boats available to them while the police have a handful, and those that they do have cannot make it into the shallow regions where the drug dealers’ boats go.

It is also difficult for the police force in other ways: It is difficult for them to detect these boats on radar; fingerprints are not digitalized; the information system of the priors of every criminal and action in Puerto Rico is inept. The government does not have enough money to effectively even out this imbalance. The dealers have a very intricate way of tracking police officers. Indeed, because so many police officers are involved in the industry, things get tricky.

Why not a documentary? Matta:

First, I’m not a documentarian… Marichal:

Well, I’ve done documentaries, but still we wanted to do a drama, because we think that drama is the best way to get to people, get them more involved emotionally. What worth is there in preaching to the choir? Matta:

Those who go see documentaries are usually people who are on the side of the documentarian. With popular entertainment, we thought we could reach more people.

In making this film you were so adamant about making it a Puerto Rican film, meaning that the story, the actors, the funds, everything would be from or of the island? Why? Matta:

We wanted to show that it could be done. Film crews do come to the island, but we wanted to show that there is a self-sustaining community here that supports film. We’re not just a set. We are a community of people who love film, just like any other community. We have the talent, resources and desire.

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