MIAMI, United States. – Imagine some despicable beings, who claim to be intellectuals, conspiring with the political police to prevent a film made in Cuba, with actors, director and technical personnel from the Island, from being shown at the so-called International Festival of New Cinema Latin American of Havana, which is celebrated from December 1 to 11.
Those same Castroite apapipios had launched against the director and writer Carlos Lechuga previously when it partially premiered Molasses in some Havana room and when Santa and Andrew It was totally censored.
Lettuce’s third feature film, Vincent B., is now the new obsession of the repressors. Registered on time at the festival in question by its skilled production team, included and deleted from the catalog, prevented from appearing in the competition and potentially scheduled during a performance, if at all, at a time that few viewers can attend.
Abel Prieto, Miguel Barnet and Fernando Rojas, who will one day dissipate from the national imagination, like the ghostly dictator Fidel Castro himself, are the champions of the censor team, which also includes other bureaucrats of military origin who lead the destinies of the battered national cinema and the cultural context itself shredded to pieces by intolerance.
The Festival, in its 43rd edition, boasts of having a program of 2,000 films, which have not yet been released, and has also included the new Arrecife award to exalt a film that deals with diversity, specifically the theme queer.
Carlos Lechuga, who has moved his residence to the city of Barcelona, recently released a public comment on the setbacks of Vincent B.. in his country of origin, after continuing to tour important film festivals around the world.
Here is a summary of their statements:
“A couple of days ago, about to have the Festival hold its press conference and start, a friend called me to tell me that the Ministry of Culture was pressuring the workers of the Havana Film Festival because they did not want to put the movie”.
“I contact a person who previously worked at the Ministry and he tells me what is happening. From the highest level of the Ministry of Culture they are denied that Vincent B. seen on the Island, despite the fact that a group of filmmakers and connoisseurs were defending it (I thank you for the attempt)”.
“Our greatest wish was that the Cubans would meet with Vincent B. in the dark room. The film is made for Cubans. For us”.
“Yesterday I found out that beyond the fact that the people at the Festival liked the film, some dark, arrogant, uneducated beings wanted to marginalize it so that it would go unnoticed”.
I remember the same thing happened to me. Santa and Andrew and the Havana Film Festival in New York; First they wanted it and then under pressure from Abel Prieto and other cultural policemen they began to treat us badly and push us aside.
“I have no problem with my film being put in the worst cinema in the world at 12:00 at night without an audience, but I only accept this if it is an artistic and not a political decision (as it has always been with me)”.
“A few days after the start of the event, having a long time before to notify us, Cuba’s proposal is to remove the film from the competition, take away passes and show it only twice in the Acapulco cinema. Download our movie. A week after the start of the Festival, they tell us that the only thing they have been allowed to do is that. In other words, it is not a decision of the event, it is not an artistic decision. It’s a police order.”
“I cannot accept a negotiation taken over by the country’s mafia policemen. That is why our team has decided not to accept those crumbs”.
“We hope that our film will be treated like the rest of the works. If not, we see ourselves in the need to withdraw it. Out of respect for us and those who worked on it”.
“A few months before I left the Island, the director of the Film Institute, Ramón Samada, called me at his office to ask if he could count on me to hold a meeting with the revolutionary filmmakers. Of course I told him not to count on me.”
“Now at this moment, beyond my desire for the people of the Island to see the film, I feel the need not to accept this police negotiation.”
“The Cuban cultural authorities since 2012, 10 years ago, have tried to silence me. Freedom of expression for me is fundamental. Let’s hope they rectify and put the film as it goes.
Until the closing of this column, the silence of members of the Cuban cinematographic union about the abuses that one of their most distinguished congeners continues to suffer is lamentable.
It is interesting to note, however, that some members of the ICAIC bureaucratic structure have tried to conspire and contradict the intentions of the political police and their servants, apparently without much success.
Within the Island, only actors like Héctor Noas and Luis Alberto García have expressed themselves on social media about the inconsistency of continuing to apply censorship to a work because its creator has decided to express himself in total freedom.
It would be good for Carlos Lechuga to hear protests from his Latin American colleagues and from other borders, invited to the Festival, for the mistreatment he is receiving in his own country. Silence will make them accomplices of the dictatorship.
OPINION ARTICLE
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