A One-Take Musical, a Merengue Queen, and the Tyler Perry Connection: Inside the 2026 New York Latino Film Festival
Hispanic Heritage Month begins September 15, and the New York Latino Film Festival opens the same night. Now in its 26th year, NYLFF is the longest-running showcase for Latino cinema in the country, and this edition brings more than 125 films from nearly 20 countries to Regal Union Square, Berkeley College, the Alianza Dominicana Cultural Center, and the United Palace in Washington Heights, before closing with a free block party at Quisqueya Plaza in Inwood on September 20.
Here is why this year's slate deserves a wider audience than the one that usually shows up.
Opening Night: Otra
The festival opens with the New York premiere of Otra, the feature directorial debut of Bronx native Armani Ortiz, executive produced by Tyler Perry. If the name Ortiz doesn't ring a bell, his résumé should. He has directed more than 100 episodes of television at Tyler Perry Studios in Atlanta, made the 2023 documentary Maxine's Baby: The Tyler Perry Story, and created the BET+ drama Perimeter. He is one of the most prolific working directors most people have never heard of, because he has spent a decade building inside Perry's machine rather than chasing festivals.
Otra is his step out. The film is a Latino movie musical told in a single continuous take, running 110 minutes. It follows Javier, who dies in a car crash and, regretting that he never found real love, tries to win back the girlfriend who once turned down his proposal by revisiting three moments from their relationship. The soundtrack pulls from Bad Bunny, Rosalía, Ozuna, Rauw Alejandro, Tainy, Marc Anthony, and Aventura, which is essentially a playlist of the last fifteen years of Latin music. A one-take musical is a technical dare on its own. A one-take musical built on that catalog is a swing.
The Perry connection is the part worth sitting with. Perry's studio has spent years being described, fairly or not, as a closed ecosystem. Here it is functioning as a launch pad for a Latino filmmaker's debut at a Latino festival, with Perry's name on the marquee as producer. That is a Black-Latinx pipeline story, and it runs through Atlanta.
The Spotlight Premiere: Milly: Queen of Merengue
On September 19, the festival moves uptown to the United Palace for Milly: Queen of Merengue, Leticia Tonos Paniagua's biopic of Milly Quezada, the Dominican singer who went from Washington Heights to multiple Grammys and the title in the film's name. Sandy Hernandez plays Quezada in what the festival is calling a breakout role. Screening a Washington Heights story inside Washington Heights' grandest theater is the kind of programming choice that only a festival rooted in its community makes.
The Star Power
Angelina Jolie's Without Blood, her fifth film as director, screens with Salma Hayek Pinault and Demián Bichir in a story of war, trauma, and revenge. It is the marquee name on the slate, but it is also a reminder that two of the most decorated Mexican actors of their generation still find their most substantial roles at festivals like this one.
What Else to See
Summer of Three, a Puerto Rican coming-of-age story, arrives as a two-time Tribeca winner. Jaripeo comes off Sundance and Berlin with a lyrical look at queer identity and rodeo culture in Michoacán. TheyDream, a U.S./Puerto Rico production, won a Special Jury Award in Sundance's NEXT section this year. The Long Con is a 14-minute short starring Emmy-nominated Baby Reindeer breakout Nava Mau. Kate del Castillo directs The Buzz / El Zumbido, a short about a celebrated actress hiding abuse behind a perfect life. And Have a nICE Day is an eight-minute story of a Dominican-American family torn apart by an ICE raid, which could not be more current.
Documentary fans should look for West Side Familia, Taylor Hosking's portrait of a Puerto Rican-led motorcycle crew holding its ground on a gentrified Upper West Side. And Face Love is a bilingual romantic comedy shot twice with the same cast, once in English and once in Spanish, released as two separate films.
The Brazil Note
Tucked into the FUTURO Digital Conference's web series showcase is Ayô, a 17-minute Brazilian short about a young Black gay artist navigating love, identity, and racism in São Paulo. Afro-Brazilian stories rarely make it into U.S. Latino festival programming, and even more rarely into the digital showcase, where creators are the audience. Worth seeking out.
FUTURO itself, presented by Audible and produced by Un Chin Media, brings creators and entrepreneurs including Sasha Merci, Milly Tamarez, Tommy Peña, and Daisy Auger-Domínguez for a day on the business of comedy, wellness, mentorship, and the creator economy. For independent media builders, that room may be as valuable as any screening.
Why It Matters
Founder Calixto Chinchilla has been saying the same thing for 26 years: the talent has never been the problem, the opportunities have. Warner Bros. Discovery returns as presenting sponsor, HBO as founding partner. That corporate backing is what allows a festival to put a debut director's one-take musical on opening night instead of a safe studio pickup. NYLFF is betting on Armani Ortiz. Cup of Soul will be watching whether the bet pays off.
The New York Latino Film Festival runs September 13–20. Tickets and schedule at nylatinofilmfestival.com.
