Cuba

Filmed in Hanoi on December 13, 1966, this documentary records the lives of people in the Vietnam capital and surrounding countryside at the height of U.S. bombing. “One of Alvarez’s indisputable masterpieces, this is a film of great sensitivity. It also displays the greatest integrity and is constructed with the greatest economy of means… Although the means are of the simplest, the editing is exceedingly subtle. The narrative line is there, yet it’s anything but linear. The result is that the film informs in a way quite alien to what documentary orthodoxy has taught us to expect.”Read More »

CICLÓN is a coverage of hurricane Flora’s sweeping the Cuban provinces of Camagüey and Oriente in October 1963: the damage, the evacuation of the villages, and the aid to victims.Read More »

Using morgue photos, newsreel footage, and a recording by Lena Horne, Cuban filmmaker Santiago Alvarez fired off ‘Now!’, one of the most powerful bursts of propaganda rendered in the 1960s.Read More »

On the 82nd anniversary of the landing of José Martí and Máximo Gómez on the cost for the war of liberation of Cuba, Fidel Castro meets with Salustiano Leyva, who at 11 years old, received in his home a visit from Martí and Gómez.Read More »

Prayer for Marilyn Monroe integrates images of the Hollywood actress and verses from Nicaraguan poet Ernesto Cardenal to create a powerful Pan-American product. Directors Miriam Talavera and Marisol Trujillo portray the harshness of the star’s life behind the glamour and glitter of show biz.Read More »

Cuban filmmaker Santiago Alvarez’s hurried response to the 1973 Chilean coup d’état rests upon the music of Victor Jara, the folk singer who was brutally murdered within days after Augusto Pinochet assumed power. Connecting events in Chile to other repressive police crackdowns throughout the world (and specifically to C.I.A. malfeasance), Alvarez calls for solidarity in a characteristically bravura choreography of text and image.Read More »

Made as Cuba was entering the economic crisis of the early 90s, King of the Jungle demonstrates Colina’s talent at capturing the sentiments of a particular moment. We observe life along Havana’s Prado street through the eyes of the lion sculpture located there.Read More »

This early work of master filmmaker Tomas Gutierrez Alea, captures the beauty of making cigars. Images of hands selecting tobacco leaves and rolling cigars are interspersed with graphic designs from cigar boxes and labels.Read More »

Aesthetics provides a humorous glimpse into Cubans’ sense of style. Enrique Colina reveals the desire for expressing individuality through diverse conceptions of beauty in everyday life whether in the form of a hood ornament, a display window, or a star-studded tooth.Read More »