was this book/movie a true story

it seemed unaccurate and whitewashed...i did enjoy the move the scenery was amazing and i loved the rum scenes because that sums up island life for me though puertorican rum is nothing to crucian rum does not come close...the movie had some good parts and depp is charming but it was like a post card...

Is the book based on a true story? it just didnt seems like the carribean my parents lived. my father is born and raised from there and my mother is a white american who lived there twenty years before i was born...i know what it was like for both locals and nonlocals down there...