/ARTS WEEKLY/FILM-CUBA: Washington Blocks Dialogue in Visa Denial

By Patricia Grogg Reprint | | Print |

Patricia Grogg

HAVANA, May 4 2004 (IPS) - "Suite Habana" and other films by Cuban director Fernando Pérez are headlining a Latin American exhibition included in the fifth Havana Film Festival, held in New York Apr. 23-28. But the director could not be there for the screenings.

Audiences in New York watched the films without him. For the second time in three months, Pérez was denied a visa to enter the United States.

"These policies hurt dialogue and cultural exchange, which should be above such barriers," he said in an IPS interview. A visa rejection prevented him from attending the 21st Miami Film Festival in February in the southern U.S. state of Florida.

"Suite Habana", Pérez’s most recent work, which won awards in 2003 at the San Sebastián festival in Spain and in Havana, premiered Friday, Apr. 23, as part of a series that also includes "Clandestinos" (1988), "Hello Hemingway" (1990), "Madagascar" (1994) and "La vida es silbar" (Life Is to Whistle, 1998).

"I just can’t understand the mentality of someone who designs a policy that suspends or limits dialogue. I was very interested in being present" for the screening of the film, said the director, who was recognised in absentia for his career achievements during the New York festival.

Pérez laments that Washington’s current immigration policy cuts off an exchange amongst filmmakers that was until just over a year ago very open, in his opinion. "It’s a shame," he said.

Sources from the Cuban Institute of Cinematographic Arts and Industry told IPS that the directors of that entity – Susana Molina and Rosa María Roviera – also failed to obtain visas to attend the festival.

In the three cases, the United States invoked Article 212-F, under which it can deny visas to individuals whose entry into the country officials deem could be "detrimental" to national interests.

Coincidentally, making its premiere at the New York festival was the documentary "Libre de viajar: la conexión Cuba-EEUU" (Free to Travel: the Cuba-U.S. Connection), by U.S. filmmaker and Cuban resident, Estela Bravo. The film is about the efforts made in the two nations to keep cultural links open.

The festival programme included 37 recent films from Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Cuba, Dominican Republic; Mexico and Puerto Rico, and held seminars to bring together filmmakers, aficionados and actors.

One of the aims of the event was to promote the efforts of established film directors and at the same time the new "values" emerging in Latin American film.

Puerto Rican filmmaker Jacobo Morales was also honoured during the festival, including screenings of "Linda Sara" and "Lo que le pasó a Santiago", which was nominated for an Oscar, the Academy Awards, in the best foreign film category in 1990.

"Suite Habana" is considered the most risk-taking and also the best developed film by Pérez, and the experts are unanimous that he has achieved artistic maturity.

The film tells real-life stories, but using techniques that are mostly associated with fiction, blurring the lines between documentary and make- believe, in an organic and totally convincing way.

There are no dialogues, narration or even interviews with the participants in the film. The spectator receives information mostly from the image and the drama of the montage, in an impeccable feat of editing.

"’Suite Habana’ surpassed all my expectations, particularly in relation to Cuban audiences," said the director in an IPS interview. "Something special happened, and I am looking for answers."

The film triggered clashing reactions on this socialist-run island, due to the harsh, crude realism in the portrayals of the daily lives of inhabitants of a Havana clamouring for something more than a new coat of paint.

These human beings, who live their days between resignation and frustrated dreams, in their movements leave the path marked with love – which tends to draw tears from audiences.

"There are detractors of ‘Suite Habana’ who don’t see it as a positive film in the traditional terms of ‘what should be’ and there are others outside of Cuba who see it as anti-Castro," said the director.

His own view is that the film is "an intimate moment in the Cuba of today," and it allowed him to confirm that reality cannot be pressed into moulds.

The film is seen from extremes "because the Cuban reality provokes it. That leaves me contented, because the language of art does not have to be simplistic, it doesn’t have to be reductive," said Pérez.