Mikhail Kalatozov

(On Cable TV, February 2020) There’s a reason why I am Cuba shows up on lists of movies with great cinematography—even today, it’s hard not to be impressed by some of the camera work on display here, even if the film itself is a blunt piece of Soviet-produced anti-American propaganda. A co-production between the USSR and Cuba, it’s a set of four connected stories showing the factors leading to and through the Cuban revolution of 1959. The script can be arbitrary, blunt and grotesque at times—the Batista-era American-run casino is portrayed as a malevolent force perverting the locals, and the “Americans” in the film all speak with exaggerated bombastic accents that feel like a parody. But it does have the merit of presenting the Cuban side of the events. As with all movies designed to whip up revolutionary fervour, it’s not subtle about sacrificing its characters to the cause—and keep in mind that this film was released merely five years after the events. But I Am Cuba is not a film to take in narratively—it’s far more interesting to watch it for the moment-to-moment decisions taken by director Mikhail Kalatozov as he comes up with insane camera movements, unusual ways to portray familiar material and emerging from the water, passing through buildings or going down several storeys as part of continuous long shots. It’s all quite amazing enough to make anyone wonder, “how did they do that?”—my favourite shot has the camera dropping down several metres to follow someone going from a casino rooftop to a pool on a lower plane. There’s an additional interest in considering that this piece of pure cinema essentially disappeared for thirty years: Never shown in the United States for obvious reasons and quickly forgotten in the USSR for being insufficiently supportive of the two regimes. It took until the 1990s, after the fall of the Soviet Union, until it was rediscovered, restored (thank you Martin Scorsese) and broadcast to a wider audience. Today, film buffs can feast on I Am Cuba as a fascinating historical artifact, and as a virtuoso display of film technique.