Cuban Revolution /Memorias Del Subdesarrollo /Tercer Cine

Outline and evaluate the picture of the Cuban Revolution that emerges from Tomás Gutiérrez Alea’s Memorias del subdesarrollo and consider the role tercer cine had in the painting of the picture.

Guevara said of revolutions that not all their details can be foreseen and that they are never perfect (Guevara, 2009: 284). In Memorias del subdesarrollo (Cuba, 1968) directed by Tomás Guttiérez Alea(based on the novel Memorias inconsolables, by Edmundo Desnoes) unforeseen details and lack of perfection are pointed out to the viewer in an ironic, sometimes almost playful fashion, through the eyes of the protagonist, Sergio Carmona (played by Sergio Corrieri).

The plot of Memorias is bounded by the invasion of Playa Girón in 1961 and the Missile Crisis of October 1962. The story is thatSergio, deserted by all his family and friends following the failed invasion meets and seduces a young girl, Elena (played by Daisy Granados). He is tried in court for her alleged rape and acquitted.

The film begins with the exodus of frightened middle class people fleeing Cuba. The Revolution in 1959 had begun to undermine their security and life-style. More and more resentment was aimed atthis sector, especially after US collusion in the failed invasion of Playa Girón. They are seen leaving with only the clothes on their backs. Even their watches and wedding rings, now property of the State, are being confiscated as they embark. This represented a substantial “brain drain” of the economic elite and executives, along with many white collar workers (Bethel, 1993: 100)

TheRevolution promised a decent livelihood to each labourer or intellectual. (Castro 2000: 406) Sergio is trying to write a book; he says he has been for years. For a writer, he shows little competence as a typist. He wonders “¿en realidad, tengo algo que decir?” Is he writing only to avoid work?

Peering through binoculars from his penthouse, Sergio looks onto housing - tenements like barrack blocks- and later in the film tiny wooden shacks are shown, in which live some of the 400,000 families comprising the Revolution’s housing problem (Castro 2000: 407). In 1960 to alleviate the housing crisis the Comités de Defensa de la Revolución (CDR) instituted the Urban Reform Law to transfer ownership of properties to their occupiers (Thakkar 2010: 713). Sergio is visited by their representatives.The male official reveals a very cavalier attitude to the precision of data he is recording. Guttiérrez Alea targeted Cuban bureaucrats in other films, too (Muerte de un burócrato, (Cuba: 1966) and Guantanamera (Cuba: 1995)).

The US blockaded trade with Cuba from January 1961. Sergio complains to his wife that he has run out of various US brands. His exiled mother sends him gum and razorblades; he needs books. The shop windows are almost empty and few books are available in the bookshop other than second hand or Soviet propaganda. There are very few cars; there is a shortage of petrol and oil and it is impossible to buy spare parts.

The Revolution’s economic strategy failed for lack of capital leading to widespread hunger. To exchange sugar for oil from the USSR almost theentire effort of the Republic is invested in its production for export, not for home consumption (Kapcia, 2005: 120).

In Cuba we are slaves to the sugar cane. (Guevara, 2009: 274)

The Revolutionary Government took control of all religious organisations’ property, although religion was not banned. When Pablo takes his car for repair the workshop he visits is an expropriated church. Privateeducation was also banned; Sergio’s old private Catholic school is now a Revolutionary Army barracks.

Revolutionary propaganda is broadcast in the film. The Batista regime is shown in its brutal venality in newsreel films. The captured invaders of Playa Girón are shown, exhibited like captured beasts, in a theatre for the whole world to see. The two groups are intercut to emphasise their...