I Am Cuba

Presented by CODEPINK Bay Area

Short introduction by Sasha Stetler, CODEPINK Bay Area Lead Coordinator, sharing reflections from their recent brigade to Cuba, along with resources for learning more about the country and ways to support the Cuban people amid the ongoing U.S. blockade, which continues to put millions at risk.

Director Mikhail Kalatozov’s delirious masterpiece unfolds in four stunning vignettes that paint a portrait of pre-revolutionary Cuba—its culture and the people who call the island home. Shot soon after the Cuban Missile Crisis, this wildly offbeat celebration of Communist iconography mixes Slavic solemnity with Latin sensuality.

Produced by Mosfilm and ICAIC, this film was started only a week after the Cuban missile crisis and was designed to be Cuba’s answer to both Sergei Eisenstein’s propaganda masterpiece, Potemkin and Jean-Luc Godard’s freewheeling romance, Breathless. But I Am Cuba turned out to be something quite unique — a wildly schizophrenic celebration of Communist iconography, mixing Slavic solemnity with Latin sensuality. The plot, or rather plots, feverishly explore the seductive, decadent (and marvelously photogenic) world of Batista’s Cuba — deliriously juxtaposing images of rich Americans and bikini-clad beauties sipping cocktails poolside with scenes of ramshackle slums filled with hungry children and gaunt old people.

Using wide-angle lenses that distort and magnify and filters that transform palm trees into giant white feathers, cinematographer Sergei Urusevsky’s acrobatic camera achieves wild gravity-defying angles as it glides effortlessly through long continuous shots. But I Am Cuba is not just a catalog of bravura technique — it also succeeds in exploring the innermost feelings of the characters and their often desperate situations.