Cuba reference information

English 165CL: Caribbean Literature (Winter 2002)
Department of English
University of California, Santa Barbara

Soy Cuba/Ya Kuba (Dir. Mikheil Kalatozishvili, 1964; 141 min.)

Original Movie Poster (Portocarrero)
Commentary and Reviews: Dennis West, Cineaste; The Nation; Images; San Francisco Chronicle; Film.com; LA Times
Student comments: 'amazing cinematography'; 'an element of coercion in the representation of the nobility of the peasant, legitimizing the Revolution'; 'unique in that people in the film could have been playing themselves'; the nightclub-drum scene with Betty was fascinating in that it suggested a kind of nativism or primitivism''; 'notable in that it tells the story of the individual people and of Cuba at the same time'; 'the episodes seem unrelated but they are in fact united'; 'very much like Battleship Potemkin'; 'aestheticizing of politics'; 'sometimes easier to pay attention to a shot than to what is happening in the scene'; 'definitely propaganda, but interesting'; 'I couldn't believe the poverty; did people really live like that?'

Alejo Carpentier, The Lost Steps/Los Pasos Perdidos (1953)
---. Explosion in a Cathedral
---. The Kingdom of This World
---. Music in Cuba (1946)

Guillermo Cabrera Infante, Three Trapped Tigers/Tres Tristes Tigres