Patria
o Muerte. Cuba: Fatherland or Death, on view at the Coral
Gables Art Cinema, is one of those films that you should not miss. This is an
excellent documentary on the social, ethical and civic reality of Cuba at this minute.
Several individuals who inhabit the Island tell the camera the routines of
their daily life, their anguish, their frustrations, their dreams, their
truncated illusions. And they do it with admirable honesty and bravery, in a
way that it is almost impossible not to shed a few tears. Yes, we are dealing
with a deeply human artwork, from which transparent and intense emotions can be
breathed, as well as great pain for the lost homeland (a shattered country,
sunk in the mire of absolute loss of the most genuine human values).
Bloggers, members of alternative musical
bands, a writer rarely published on the Island, a singer, a graffiti artist, a
painter, an architect, a transgender, a housewife are just some of the
characters that draw a complex and polyhedral landscape, almost surreal,
difficult to understand for those who do not live the drama from within.
This documentary is impressive. Shocking
and heartbreaking. It is hard to see on the screen the most intimate essence of
several generations that have lost all utopias, and live in an immovable
present, without a projection of future, without being able to elucidate the
"why" or the reason for their existence in the world. This is sad,
devastating. It is a Cuba where ethics has become a fairy tale. A country where
evasion seems the safest key to success.
And all of the above is presented in a compact script, very well
There is no political rhetoric in this
documentary. What matters here are the lives of the citizens, those anonymous
heroes who struggle in the midst of their stormy and harsh everyday reality,
while others decided to leave. It is not a democratic model or a political
proposal that is the subject of discussion. It is, however, something as simple
as a house that collapses before the eyes of a child who does not understand
anything, or the indifference of a humble woman who has lost all desire to
live, without even understanding the causes of her lethargy.
We are, in short,
before a complete film work. A masterpiece that sweats talent and honesty. For
my part, I could not contain a single one of my tears. I have cried a lot, yes,
when I see my effigy in the mirror.
PATRIA
O MUERTE: CUBA, FATHERLAND OR DEATH was directed by Olatz López Garmendia;
executive producer: Julian Schnabel; co-producer: Miguel A. Sirgado;
cinematographer: Claudio Fuentes Madan; editor: Ismael de Diego. The film´s
debut on cable TV will be on MONDAY, NOV. 28 (8:00-9:00 p.m. ET/PT),
exclusively on HBO.
Píter
Ortega Núñez
Art
Critic
Miami,
November 2016
