Havana Film Festival Features Varied Cuban Representation

The 46th Havana New Latin American Film Festival, taking place from December 4th to 14th, will feature a diverse range of Cuban entries competing for the Coral Prizes and for exhibition.

Dedicated to the centenary of the renowned intellectual Alfredo Guevara, one of the founders of the Cuban Institute of Cinematic Art and Industry (ICAIC) and a great promoter of national audiovisual and cultural development, the event will see 222 works from 42 countries in competition.

Within this broad spectrum of fiction features, first works, documentary features, short films, animation, and other categories, this year's official selection includes several domestic films highlighted by film critic Joel del Río in an article for the newspaper Juventud Rebelde.

Neurótica Anónima is one of them. Based on the homonymous play, it is directed by renowned actors Jorge Perugorría and Mirta Ibarra—the latter also being the author of the stage production—who stars as Iluminada, a woman whose frustrations lead to a neurosis: living as if she were always inside a movie.

Del Río notes that the cast also features standout performances by Fernando Hechavarría, who plays an architect; Osvaldo Doimeadiós (the psychiatrist); Andrea Doimeadiós (the young Iluminada), Néstor Jiménez, Paula Alí, Tahimi Alvariño, Bárbaro Marín, Mario Limonta, Hilario Peña, Félix Beatón, and Luis Silva, among many others.

Among the Cuban titles in the fiction feature category is also Cherri, by Fabián Suárez, which tells the story of an overweight, gay choreographer who works in a ballet company for plus-sized people while caring for his disabled husband.

"Fabián usually works in a cinema with a marked personal, auteur imprint, with edges of experimentation and symbolism. Here he returns to themes that are very close to him, such as unsatisfied desire, loyalty, love as the most complicated of human emotions, and faith in second or third chances," commented the film critic.

In the first works competition, the sole Cuban representative is Baracoa, a co-production with Italy, with a script and direction by Luis Ernesto Doñas.

According to the author, "it tells a physical and personal journey of two completely opposite men who cross the island with a promise to fulfill and wounds to heal. It is a story about friendship, identity, and love. There are many Cubas, and each one of them defines each character."

In the short fiction film category are the works Anba Dlo, by Rosa Caldeira and Luiza Calagian; Casting para Carmen, by Patricia Rodda; El último juego, by Daniel Chile; Norheimsund, by Ana Alpízar; Primera enseñanza, by Aria Sánchez and Marina Meira; Pupa, by Leandro de la Rosa; and Ponto Cego, by Marcel Beltrán, who directed it in Brazil.

Vying for the Coral Prize in the documentary feature category, Cuban cinema will be represented by Mijaín, by filmmakers Rolando Almirante, Ángel Alderete, and Héctor Villar, a profile of athlete Mijaín López, a five-time Olympic Champion in Greco-Roman Wrestling, considered one of the greatest wrestlers of all time.

Also competing for the festival's top awards, in the short documentary category, are Tiempo Detenido, by Ariagna Fajardo, and Dormidos Sobre Rodillas Calientes, made in Cuba by the Italian Giuseppe Polerá.

In the animation section, the national short films in competition are La Niña y el Mar, by Ray Ortega; Mi Mejor Amiga, by Ruth Garaicoa; Rapto, by Ivette Ávila; and El Jardín, co-directed by Miguel Alejandro Machado and Carolina Fernández-Vega.

Joel del Río clarified that his selection may have "involuntarily omitted some Cuban titles that are part of the event, but we wanted to promote, at least, the most novel and lesser-known ones" to demonstrate that "Cuban cinema is on the move and encompasses diverse and extraordinary spaces."