A story about a simple man from the mountains, Guaguasi, who falls in love with a beautiful chorus girl, Marina, during the Cuban Revolution. Guaguasi joins the rebels and arrives in Havana at the end of Batista's dictatorship, and, in the midst of political turmoil, is swept off his feet by the mesmerising Marina. The story celebrates the vitality and lunacy of the Revolution period with surrealism, humor and sensuality and is a compassionate metaphor about the human condition.
Acting
Orestes Matacena's guileless mountain-man energy is genuinely hypnotic
Production
Havana 1959 recreated with dreamlike, barely-contained chaos
Writing
Treats revolution as horny, funny, and fundamentally human
Director
Jorge Ulla
Trivia, insights & behind the scenes
Shot in the Dominican Republic standing in for Cuba because, well, obvious reasons in 1983.
One of the few Cuban Revolution films to treat the period with carnivalesque sensuality rather than socialist realism—no wonder it's barely discussed in official Cuban film history.
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