Shattered dreams behind the sugar curtain

Having breakfast without milk, taking a bath without soap, cooking without oil, for a whole Cuban generation it meant passing from the age of innocence under a generous state that provided them with almost everything to their adulthood in the 1990s, under a Special Period where that state almost fell apart.

The country changed from one day to the next and so did the Cubans. But, what about their dreams? Where did they go?

The documentary The Sugar Curtain (France/ Cuba, 80’) shows that transition, featuring Camila Guzman, the film’s director, and some of her friends still living in the Caribbean island, their life nowadays and the contrasting memories from their childhood.

The film is part of the programme of Discovering Latin America, the sixth Latin American Film Festival that took place in London between late November and December 2nd.

They were children in the 1980s, the golden years of the Cuban Revolution. Cuba had overcome the crisis of the 1970s and there was a better provision of material comfort. “We didn’t care about money, and we didn’t see our parents coming home in distress. We had almost everything solved,” says one of Camila’s friends.

The “new man” –a mix of altruistic and Jesus-like behaviour- that Che Guevara had envisioned at the beginning of the Revolution in the 1960s, seemed attainable twenty years later. The future was an opened door, leading to a glowing path.

The 90s

But at the end of that decade the Berlin Wall fell. It marked the end of the Cuban Utopia and the crisis burst onto their lives. The door to the future was not so clear then, and there was not a visible path beyond it.

The Sugar Curtain is a must-see for those seeking to understand Cuban reality from a more humane approach. The strong images of the protagonists’ houses or the ones from holiday camps shows the contrast between what Cuba was and what it is now.

Tears often come out from their eyes when they talk, stressing the dramatic experience and the trauma of people who are still trying to unravel the enigma, what would happen had things evolved differently?

Camila’s history is paradigmatic. Her parents came from Chile to Cuba when she was just 9 months old, avoiding Pinochet Junta’s repression. She was brought up in a safe and stable environment, in a flat that Cuba gave the family for free.

She was happy without concerns like her Cuban friends, until the crisis and her intellectual maturity came together to make her clash with the system. As many of her friends, she then left the country.

However, like many of them, Camila’s inner self remains living in Cuba.

Discovering Latin America was the perfect opportunity to appreciate feature films, short films and documentaries from that continent and to make a small contribution for a change.

The event’s revenues will be allocated to Task Brazil Trust, which helps street children and adolescents in Rio do Janeiro to get integrated back into society.