I Am Cuba (1964)

Perfectly adorable

everything you have heard about this movie is true.

It's a mild crowd pleaser for people who are exhausted by blockbusters.

The film may be flawed, but its message is not.

I had the great displeasure of sitting through this piece of rubbish film. Yes, I know it is supposed to be historical, it is a Soviet-Cuban propaganda film and the camera work is supposed to be fantastic. This film only appeals to ignorant students who think they know more than anybody because they "are for the people and justice" and communists. As Billy Joel once said, "I had my pointless point of view." ALL the scenes are way too long, hammering the point home in 20 minutes when it was understood in 3 minutes. The nightclub singer repeating Crazy Love so many times you go loco, following the student revolutionary for 20 minutes through a building and up to the roof, a guy running through plants for 10 minutes, come on, enough! I bring this up because both the writer and the director are applauded as fantastic when their work, propaganda or not, is worse than an Adam Goldberg family video. Please don't waste your time with this film. Go get experimental brain surgery instead.

"I am Cuba" is a Soviet funded propaganda film designed to promote international socialism. It deals with the Cuban revolution but is mostly remembered for its acrobatic and innovative camera work.The film was virtually unknown for a number of years, before reappearing in the late 80s. Its inventive style would prove hugely influential on both Paul Thomas Anderson and late period Scorsese. "Goodfellas" and "Casino" owe much to this film. "Boogie Nights" also copies a long take, in which a camera prowls a party before eventually diving into a swimming pool.Director Mikhail Kalatozov, who made the excellent "The Cranes are Flying", remains virtually unknown today. His films are filled with remarkably complex long takes and some pretty daring camera-work. For "I am Cuba" he custom made his own rigs, dollies and camera mounts, and as a result the film has a virtuosity that you simply didn't see in the 50s and 60s. Kalatozov zooms along buildings, hurtles up staircases, zaps down Cuban streets and plunges through pulsating crowds. The film's actual plot consists of 4 interwoven stories, designed to promote revolution and the "greatness of socialism". The problem is, Kalatozov is so in love with his camera that he completely forgets he's making a propaganda flick. The film touches upon some facts, highlighting that a handful of American owned mega corporations were oppressing the vast majority of Cuban people, but it also makes Capitalism seem damn seductive, by focusing on snazzy American hotels, partying Cubans and the fun nightlife.As a result of the film's confused message, "I am Cuba" was rejected by its Marxist backers. The film's flamboyant style was seen to be too free, too liberating, thereby obscuring the intended message. We see shanty towns and poverty and yet Kalatozov makes it all seem so damn sexy.7.5/10 - A strange film. Still, it remains a technical milestone.Worth one viewing.

Maybe one of the best movies ever made! I think I could watch Kalatozishvili (say it three times fast) film grass grow and be spellbound. The camera literally dances, and is a character in it's own right.Four stories about the Cuban life before, during, and ending with the revolution. We see the Havana nightclub prostitute (the films most dazzling moments, like coming to Cuba for the firs time), a farmer whose loosing his land to US Fruit(the films most spiritual moment), a student activist poised to be a terrorist or a martyrs, and a family man and pacifist driven to war...but who cares! This is not an effective propaganda film because by the end of the movie, your not so much mad at the big bad West, as you are just disappointed there isn't more. You care about the characters certainly, but you care about them as individuals, beset by the troubles of "life", and not as a faceless nation, engaging in a "fight". Propahganda to work needs a "them" for "us" to turn our attention towards, look at Micheal Moore's films, for examples of this. "I Am Cuba" has foreign and internal devils, but each story is told so well, you feel for the characters, and not some abstract notion of the "the Cuban people".The sheer cinematic strength of the film, it's composition, AMAZING tracking shots(ripped off by Paul Thomas Anderson, Martin Scorcesse, and Tartovsky, to name a few...they each steal scenes, and even then that's not half of the amazing images.), music, and performances are so good they transform and transcend the story. What Sergio Leone did for the Western in "Once Upon A Time In The West", and Stanley Kubrick did for science fiction in "2001: A Space Odyssey", is equivalent to what this film does for propaganda.Cuban public at the time though it was too stereotypical (a fair critique, the director and crew are mostly Russian), Soviets thought it was too soft on capitalism and the west, film makers everywhere I imagine wet themselves.Quite possibly one of the best films ever, never seen in the US, til the mid 90's. The portrayals of Americans are amusing to say the least (think of all those furry hated evil Russians in cold war movies to be fair. Think "Red Dawn" for Christ sakes) Anyway if you like "great films" see this, its exhilarating and beautiful, and as a whole it more than makes up for the sum of its parts. Incredible.

I Am Cuba (1964) A breathtaking marvel of cinematography. Mikhail Kalatozov's I am Cuba, a joint production between Soviet and Cuban filmmakers, remains an astounding visual success, with its inventive and freewheeling camera style that went on to influence so many. So legendary is the films style that a great many filmmakers today likely do not even realize that they've been influenced by it through the work of other directors such as Martin Scorcese.The film, a hyper stylised perhaps propaganda film (although the film was berated on both sides - by the Russians as too sympathetic to Americans, by the West as entirely unsympathetic to Americans), it flows (and really is there a better word to describe this?) through a series of vignettes, dealing rebellious youths to slimy members of Western bourgeoisie.One could discuss the incredible long and free form shots, moving up and down buildings, in and out of water, soaring over crowded city streets - it is a technical marvel, at its release and even still today. The stories often get left out of discussion because of this, but it should be noted that they are quite powerful and moving, and propaganda or not, they express some profound tellings of the eploitative relationship between the wealthy American business class and the Bastista dictatorship.Whatever your political leaning, I am Cuba is an unquestioned masterpiece and innovator of the visual language of cinema.