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Havana Film Festival opens
BY MIREYA CASTAÑEDA – Granma
International staff writer –
ALFREDO Guevara once again gave the keynote address
at the inauguration of the International Festival of
New Latin American Cinema. On the occasion of the
25th festival, the event’s president reaffirmed the
continuity and constant renewal of the region’s
filmmaking and thus its annual encounter in Havana.
 Guevara’s
remarks ended a restrained ceremony that began with
a short documentary of the most significant people
and the most relevant figures of these 25
gatherings.
Those attending the event at the Karl Marx theater
applauded, perhaps somewhat slowly, on discovering
the then-young Geraldo Sarno receiving the Grand
Coral Award at the first Festival for Coronel
Delmiro Gouveia; Titón Gutiérrez Alea raising
that same award in the air in 1983 for Hasta
Cierto Punto (Up to a Certain Point); or Pino
Solanas, 1985 winner for Tangos, El Exilio de
Gardel (Tangos, Gardel’s Exile). Then, the
arrival of another generation in the ‘90s, with
Fernando Pérez, Luis Alberto Lamata, or Jorge Fons,
and the entry to the 21st century with Lucrecia
Martel, Luiz Fernando Calvalho or Karim Ainouz.
The articulated truth of the constant renewal of
filmmaking and of the Festival was totally expressed
by the selection of the film Hoy y mañana
(Today and Tomorrow), a first work by Argentine
Alejandro Chomski, to initiate the screenings.
The Coral Awards, logically, are given on the last
day of the Festival, but on this occasion, one
exception was made. The maestro Leo Brouwer, one of
the most important figures in contemporary music who
has composed so much for Cuban and Latin American
cinema (Historias de la Revolución (Histories
of the Revolution), La muerte de un burócrata
(Death of a Bureaucrat), Alsino y el cóndor (Alsino
and the Condor), Visa USA, Como agua para
chocolate (Like Water for Chocolate) received an
honorary Coral handed to him by composer and poet
Silvio Rodríguez. Both of them are founders of the
now mythic ICAIC’s Sound Experimentation Group.
Hours earlier, at the Hotel Nacional, the jurors for
the different categories were presented. Among them
are outstanding figures like Miguel Littin, Eliseo
Subiela, Felipe Cazals and Román Chalbaud, who in
addition is presenting one of the Festival’s
retrospectives (the others are of Jean Renoir, The
60s generation in Argentine cinema, and The Festival
Remembered).
The Exaudi Chorus, in honor of the 200th anniversary
of the death of Esteban Salas (Havana 1725-Santiago
de Cuba 1803), sang one of his carols, “Toquen
presto a fuego” (Playing ready to fire). A title
doubtless very appropriate for the Festival’s
opening.
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