The Challenge
We were tasked with promoting the 2026 edition of the Puerto Rico Queer Filmfest in one of the most challenging socio-political climates the island has faced for queer rights in over a decade. In early 2026, under the administration of Jenniffer González Colón, a series of legislative and institutional actions intensified pressure on the LGBTQ+ community. Law 26 restricted transgender individuals from using public restrooms aligned with their gender identity in government buildings, including campuses of the University of Puerto Rico. At the same time, institutional support structures—such as diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives—were dismantled, while further legislative efforts targeting gender-affirming care and the potential return of conversion therapy signaled a broader rollback of rights. Within this context, the festival—founded in 2008 and long established as the island’s primary cultural platform for LGBTQ+ visibility—faced a fundamental contradiction. The very stories it exists to celebrate were increasingly the ones being challenged and suppressed. We recognized that a conventional campaign focused on announcing dates and programming would feel disconnected from reality. At the same time, leaning too heavily into overt activism risked reducing the festival to a purely political statement, potentially alienating a community already navigating fatigue and vulnerability. Our challenge, therefore, was to find a way to promote the festival that acknowledged the cultural and political tension of the moment—without losing sight of its core purpose: to be a space for stories, expression, and visibility.
The Solution
we redefined the role of the campaign by turning it into the programming itself. Instead of promoting the festival with traditional messaging, we created the very kind of stories the Puerto Rico Queer Filmfest exists to champion. Under the platform “Cada Historia Cuenta,” we produced three original short films, each set in everyday spaces where queer identity is often lived in silence. In “Panas,” two men sit on a park bench the morning after an intimate encounter, navigating a quiet ritual of mutual denial. In “Mamá,” a daughter uncovers her elderly mother’s lifelong love story with another woman—revealed only as dementia strips away years of silence. In “De Damas,” a trans woman exits a bathroom stall and calmly confronts the unspoken prejudice of two strangers. The campaign name carried a deliberate dual meaning in Spanish: “cuenta” means both “to tell” and “to matter.” Every story is told. Every story counts. To maximize impact, we launched the films in Caribbean Cinemas, Puerto Rico’s largest theater circuit, screening them before feature films across the island. This ensured the audience wasn’t self-selected—it was everyone who bought a ticket. In a context where legislation was actively regulating where trans people can exist, these stories became unskippable in mainstream cinema. Rather than creating ads that looked like films, we created films that functioned as the campaign. In doing so, the promotion became proof of purpose: the most powerful argument for the festival’s existence was simply showing the stories it exists to tell.