Cuban Cinema Display
1-31 January 2006
One Way or Another
The arrival of Fidel Castro and his barbudos in Havana in 1959 marked the beginning of the Instituto Cubano de Arte e Industria Cinematografica's (Cuban Institute for Cinematic Art and Industry) film production. The creation of the ICAIC was the result of the first post-revolutionary legislation concerning the arts, which demonstrates the significance of cinema for the new political project.
The bfi National Library reading room display
From the 1 to 31 January 2006, the bfi National Film Theatre provided a rare opportunity for audiences by presenting a balanced retrospective of Cuban films which included: cinematic portraits of Havana (The Belle of The Alhambra, Memories of Underdevelopment, Maria Antonia, Madagascar, Suite Havana); comedies (Death of a Bureaucrat, House Swap, Too Much Fear of Life, Life Is to Whistle); gender films (Portrait of Teresa, One Way or Another, Strawberry and Chocolate); historical movies (The Last Supper, Lucía) and more recent productions by veteran and novel filmmakers as in the case of Julio García Espinosa (Queen and King) and Juan Carlos Cremata (Nada and Viva Cuba). Each film is a key document of Cuban cultural history. The season also offered a panel discussion with British specialists.
Death of a Bureaucrat and Strawberry and Chocolate
The bfi National Library is an invaluable source of information concerning both ICAIC film production and co-productions. The library holds special editions of important and overlooked Cuban books on film history, written by some of the pioneers of film criticism in the Americas such as Cine y revolución en Cuba and Teorie e pratiche del cinema cubano.
There is a significant collection of Cuban film periodicals such as Cine Cubano, Cineguia, and Revista de la Universidad de la Habana, which are difficult to find anywhere else. The library indexes a large number of international articles about Cuban cinema, allowing access to key essays written by Cuban filmmakers such as Julio García Espinosa and Tomás Gutiérrez Alea. Additionally, the library holds press cuttings and festival materials as well as a number of press books and unpublished scripts of Cuban films, including many of those in the 2006 retrospective at the NFT.
This is a unique and diverse collection and certainly an attractive centre for anyone interested in 'the other' cinema.
Vladimir Smith, Spanish & Latin American Studies, University College London
