The fugitive image: Deframing, memory and the revolution in Desde La Habana ¡1969! Recordar/From Havana 1969! To Remember (Guillén Landrián 1970)

Abstract

In 1968, the Cuban government led by Fidel Castro prepared the celebration of the 100th anniversary of the country’s independence wars marked by a notion of history conceived as a teleological process of which the revolution was the culmination. However, in Desde La Habana ¡1969! Recordar/From Havana 1969! To Remember (Guillén Landrián 1970), Landrián replaced the dominant conception of history with a fragmented and immersive sensorial experience. I argue that Landrián’s film staged a radical resistance to the homogenizing enterprise carried out by the official cultural policies in post-revolutionary Cuba. Contrary to the epic tone of Cuban cinema in the 60s, the revolution’s leaders in Landrián’s film are always deframed and displaced towards the margins of the shot, merged into a larger context of chaotic events. Hence, Landrián’s framing produced a dissident practice that introduced alternative temporalities, subjectivities and a unique cinematic experience in Cuban cinema.