IMDb > Soy Cuba (1964)
Soy Cuba
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Soy Cuba (1964) -- Open-ended Trailer from Milestone

Overview

User Rating:
7.6/10   2,542 votes
MOVIEmeter: ?
Down 18% in popularity this week. See why on IMDbPro.
Director:
Mikhail Kalatozov
Writers:
Enrique Pineda Barnet (writer)
Yevgeni Yevtushenko (writer)(Cuban version)
Contact:
View company contact information for Soy Cuba on IMDbPro.
Release Date:
December 1995 (USA) more
Genre:
Drama more
Plot:
Four vignettes in Batista's Cuba dramatize the need for revolution; long, mobile shots tell almost wordless stories... more | add synopsis
Plot Keywords:
more
Awards:
2 wins & 1 nomination more
NewsDesk:
A Take Above the Rest
 (From SoundOnSight. 18 October 2009, 1:13 AM, PDT)

User Comments:
Why does everyone focus on the technicalities?!!? more (46 total)

Cast

  (Cast overview, first billed only)
Sergio Corrieri ... Alberto
Salvador Wood
José Gallardo ... Pedro
Raúl García ... Enrique
Luz María Collazo ... Maria / Betty
Jean Bouise ... Jim (in Cuban version) (as Jean Bouisse)
Alberto Morgan
Celia Rodriguez ... Gloria (in Cuban version) (as Zilia Rodríguez)
Fausto Mirabal
Roberto García York ... American activist
María de las Mercedes Díez
Bárbara Domínguez
Jesús del Monte (as Isis del Monte)
Luisa María Jiménez ... Teresa
Mario González Broche ... Pablo (in Cuban version) (as Mario González)
more
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Additional Details

Also Known As:
Я - Куба (Soviet Union: Russian title)
I Am Cuba
Me, Kuba (Soviet Union: Georgian title)
Ya Kuba (Soviet Union: Russian title)
more
Runtime:
141 min
Country:
Soviet Union | Cuba
Language:
Spanish | English
Aspect Ratio:
1.37 : 1 more
Sound Mix:
Mono
Certification:
Brazil:18 | Italy:T (2005) | Singapore:PG | UK:PG | Finland:K-12 | Switzerland:12 (canton of Geneva) | Switzerland:12 (canton of Vaud) | Argentina:13
Filming Locations:
Cuba more

Fun Stuff

Trivia:
The now famous long take that begins at the top of the hotel, then winds around and down into the swimming pool, originally come out of the water and continued. The camera was hand held, passed from crew member to crew member, to make its way down the side of the hotel into the pool. The camera lens had been equipped with a high speed, spinning glass disk taken from a submarine periscope. The spinning disk was installed to fling water drops of the lens when the camera emerged from the swimming pool at the end of the shot. Much to the disappointment of the camera crew, director Mikhail Kalatozov cut the end of the take, ending it underwater. more
Goofs:
Revealing mistakes: Mariano repeatedly fires and cocks his bolt-action rifle, but no shell casings are ejected. more
Quotes:
Pedro: I used to think the most terrifying thing in life is death. Now I know the most terrifying thing in life is life. more
Movie Connections:
Referenced in Boogie Nights (1997) more

FAQ

This FAQ is empty. Add the first question.
56 out of 66 people found the following comment useful.
Why does everyone focus on the technicalities?!!?, 11 June 2006
9/10
Author: NIKITIN-1 from Russian Federation

Just about every comment posted here eulogises Soy Cuba's camera-work, which is certainly understandable as it is remarkably filmed, but this is done to the neglect of other extremely important aspects. Whether they are bigger fans of the camera-work or of the direction, however, all the commentators on these pages seem to share the caveat that arguably the main point of the film - its plot - amounts to nothing more than "silly propaganda" or a curiosity of totalitarian film making. Such an attitude is a terrible oversight! Soy Cuba is about people's desire for freedom and a better life, and the revolutionary potential of this desire when conditions reach a point beyond which people will no longer endure. It is about self respect, and courage, will and humanity and a human, filial patriotism; it is about the distillation of Cuba as an idea and a cause for justice and empowerment. I cannot understand how deeply postmodern and jaded, or just plain superficial, someone has to be to notice all the nuances of angle and light and completely miss the deep emotional and spiriual poetry of the content (in fact, the US government certainly paid good attention, for it banned the film until 1992)! It is like discussing Korda's portrait of Che Guevara in terms of focus and aperture alone!Did they not feel goosebumps as they watched the scene of the students on the steps, and the dead dove? I am lost for words! Indeed, if it were just a vapid propaganda piece, what explains its de facto censorship in the Soviet Union? I am quite sure that many of these commentators must have visited the Caribbean on holiday at one time or another; I know from my own experiences, and they ought to have immediately realised on seeing the film, that the portrait the it paints of Cuba remains the reality of Jamaica, Dominican Republic, Haiti today, some 65 years later. Watching this film, we should above all feel indignant, rather than heaping praise onto disembodied and decontextualised technicalities such as camera-work. To dismiss it as propaganda yet ogle at its images is akin to prostituting this beautiful, very deeply moving, and inspiring film, the same way that Cuba herself was prostituted. Shame on you.

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Message Boards

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Recent Posts (updated daily)User
Anyone seen this Applejacksheartattack
Song/Soundtrack help! adouglas60
Versions without Russian dubbing??? sleepy928
Mikhail Kalatozov never directed anything divxil
Cinematography + DVD hydrobomb
Identifying locations: Hotel in long take and nightclub eagle-78
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