Necronarratives, Ethics of Care, and Female Bonding in Twenty-First-Century Puerto Rican Cinema: Perfume de gardenias (Gisela Rosario Ramos, 2021) and La pecera (Glorimar Marrero-Sánchez, 2023)

In recent years, Puerto Rico has seen the emergence of a novel generation of female filmmakers whose distinctive perspectives, languages, and narratives have invigorated the local film industry and amplified the representation of national and personal realities in critical times. In this essay, I examine how female directors address issues of mourning and death within the context of overlapping crises (political, health, socioeconomic, and environmental) that force female characters to rely on constructing alternative modes of living, interacting, and finding meaning. Our discussion pays particular attention to Perfume de gardenias (2021) by Gisela Rosario Ramos and La pecera (The Fishbowl, 2023) by Glorimar Marrero-Sánchez. Inspired by the emerging yet macabre practice of performative funeral rites on the island, Perfume de gardenias offers elderly women an unexpected social role by allowing them to create custom funerals while creating affective and communal bonds. On La pecera, the main character faces her own mortality by renouncing chemotherapy and choosing to delve into ecological activism, social relations, and auto-determination. These fictions address how women, through their dialogue and response to mourning and death, defy social conventions and expectations, build affective communities, and affirm in unforeseen ways their lives and social bodies.