Oceans Are the Real Continents
Alex and Edith, a young couple in their 30s, live their relationship made up of small gestures and everyday life among the ruins of Cuban buildings. Milagros, an elderly woman now retired, tries to survive by selling peanuts and spends her days listening to the radio and reading old letters. Frank and Alain, two nine-year-old friends, go to school and dream of emigrating together to the United States to become Major League Baseball players. Against the backdrop of San Antonio De Los Baños, a town in inland Cuba where time seems to stand still, these three narratives and their respective worlds unfold. Over this mosaic of contemporaneity, however, brought to life through the characters' memories, hovers the specter of separation, the true great scourge of Cuban society.
Reel Scope@reelfilmophile
Rewatch confirms…this is a masterpiece. The perspective storytelling, layered messaging, aesthetic choices, sound design, all so delicately and intentionally put together. The art speaks for itself. There are so many backdrop-worthy stills you can take from this; as well as quotes.
Watching this the second time was so much more enriching & satisfying. I took pages of notes that I will try to condense into a concise summary of my interpretation of this film.
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**_**“We’re growing up. We have to work hard to make our dreams come true.”**_**
The idea, that a Cuban trogon will die if it’s caged up or boxed in, as will a human, is a brilliant early strike for the theme of this movie. In relation to artists being put in a box creatively or locked off from certain aspects or levels in their field, it really limits their potential expressive expansion and/or kills their ability to truly succeed at being themselves.
_“Just concentrate on what you can express. Make use of your experience. The rest depends on the audience.”_
The visual language is such an expression of the movies ideas & themes. They’re in a town where it feels like time stands still, and they visualize it with black & white coloring and static shots that linger with little to no camera movement. The cinematography makes you feel caged-in, stuck in time & the town. It feels like it slowly eats away at your ability to move forward in life in any meaningful way. It makes everything we’re watching feel real.
_“The camera is not the problem, the reality is.”_
The camera only moved or zoomed four total times in this film. The first one isn’t until almost an hour into it. We get… 1) a slow zoom onto a bird in a cage, restless & frantic. 2) a slow tilt up from Milagros crying to all her letters hanging from a clothesline to dry above her. 3) slow zoom in to Alex in his seat, watching Edith’s puppet show. and 4) the slow zoom out at the train depot, with all our characters in frame and a train entering the picture.
_”…each seat will have a different point of view. Make sure he’s visible. Don’t just move him for the heck of it.”_ (a nod to the camerawork)
It addressed multiple stages of life through our three main storylines. Fran & the kids represent dreams/goals, finding inspiration, and the hope that truly anything is possible. Alex & Edith (young adult/middle aged couple), represent experiences & expression. Last, there’s Milagros (older generation), who represents dreams & experiences turning into memories, and dealing with the grief of that long-life lived.
_“We’ll build a bridge between our memory, our existence, and the reality of our surroundings.”_
Calling the destroyed movie theater a “celluloid cemetery” was a gut punch.
_“It's impossible for me to shake off the nostalgia, you know? It’s impossible to shake off the memories & things I truly love.”_
There’s so many other throughlines & messages you can take from this film but I’ll leave the rest for future watches.
“Everything needs to change here to remain the same.”