El futuro es hoy (2009): A Poetic Look at Generation Y or 90

• DOI: https://doi.org/10.13169/intejcubastud.6.2.0189
• Published date: 01 December 2014
• Date: 01 December 2014
• Pages: 189-204
• Author: Enrique Avila López
• Subject Matter: documentary,Havana,Sandra Gómez,cinema,Cuba,ICAIC

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EL FUTURO ES HOY 2009: A POETIC LOOK AT

GENERATION Y OR 90

Enrique Avila López

Mount Royal University, Calgary

Abstract

This article analyses Sandra Gómez’s Cuban documentary El futuro es hoy, which has won

awards not only in Cuba but also in Europe. The article f‌irst studies in detail the content

of this short f‌ilm, whose main theme focuses upon the current situation in Cuba and,

specif‌ically, what the seven protagonists think about their future in the island. The article

then situates Sandra’s work within the Hispanic cinematic context. The conclusion is that

the f‌ilm is derived from both f‌ilm and literary inf‌luences and argues that it has a poetic

character observed in her particular way of portraying the current state of affairs in Cuba.

Finally, the article places her work within the so-called ‘Generation Y’ or ‘90’ in Cuba.

Keywords: documentary, Havana, Sandra Gómez, cinema, Cuba, ICAIC

El futuro es hoy (2009) is a short 35-minute documentary based on an idea,

photography and direction of Sandra Gómez (1976–) shot in Havana between

2006 and 2008. It is the second documentary by this young director graduated

from the International School of Film and Television in Havana (2004), who

moved to Zurich (Switzerland), where she has been living since 2005. It is in

Switzerland where, thanks to the producer Peacock Film, Sandra receives

funding for her f‌ilms. Therefore, this is a f‌ilm that has not been f‌inanced by the

Cuban government, but which has won awards in Cuba as well as receiving

international awards.1 Signif‌icantly, Sandra’s cinema seems to be born with a

vocation to highlight what Cuban and cubanidad mean in Cuba today.2

In her f‌irst documentary Las camas solas (14 minutes, 2006), her commitment

is already evident, with its obvious sensitivity to the current reality of Havana,

which is portrayed through a dismal episode in the recent history of the capital

– the devastation of Hurricane Ivan in 2004. The catastrophe caused the

Cuban government to shelter many families as a result of the damage, leaving

dilapidated buildings and ‘single beds’, as the title poetically suggests. However,

Mother Nature does not seem to be the only culprit in the state of deterioration

that is Havana and Cuba in general. Starting, perhaps ironically, using a natural

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190 ACADEMIC ARTICLE  ENRIQUE AVILA LÓPEZ

I J  C S 6.2 W 2014

accident, the beauty of this f‌ilm lies in the ability of Gómez to introduce a sad

and dilapidated city. The urban area of Havana is portrayed in a way that evokes

tears not only because of the hurricane but unfortunately mostly, and here comes

the political message, because of the evident need for an urban renewal that was

claimed in the 1960s as one of the specif‌ic projects of the Cuban revolution,

but is yet to come. Within this historical context, the attempt to enact a ruined

city goes beyond the purely aesthetic: the poetics of Las camas solas contains a

political message, albeit initially, ambiguous.

Using as a pretext the destructive effects of Hurricane Ivan, Las camas

solas shows a social attitude committed to portraying the lack of new homes

in Havana. However, Sandra’s commitment is in principle ambivalent. On one

hand, it could be argued that Hurricane Ivan is read as not just an accident

of nature but rather it symbolises a Cuban government that comes to act as a

permanent cyclone, generating sorrow and distress. This position would be an

example of the group of Cuban intellectuals, already mentioned by the scholar

Linda Howe, who are not afraid to examine the ways in which government

restrictions have distorted ‘our understanding of post-revolutionary Cuban

cultural history’ (Howe 2004: 14).

However, the work of Sandra Gómez could also be interpreted through a

Marxist prism: this is a documentary that represents another case of artistic

freedom, coinciding with utopian values promoted by the Revolution and, in

this particular case, by the Cuban Institute of Cinematographic Art and Industry

(ICAIC founded in 1959 by the Cuban government). Since the 1960s, the

ICAIC has been promoting f‌ilms that include criticism of many aspects of the

Revolution. As the critic John Hess has suggested, this would be the reason why

many Cuban f‌ilms continue to fascinate viewers both inside and outside Cuba

(Hess 1999: 207).

This article will attempt to unravel the commitment seen in the work of Sandra

Gómez. Specif‌ically, it focuses on the analysis of the documentary El futuro es

hoy, which, it is argued, is f‌ilmed with great poetic sensibility, in the sense that

it shows us a harsh reality but is sensitive at the same time. The main conclusion

drawn is that Sandra Gómez is conf‌irmed as a Cuban f‌ilmmaker able to sensitise

the audience to poetic truths through highly personal manner of f‌ilming, which

is characterised by going beyond mere criticism, becoming a f‌ilmmaker–writer

of her time.

El futuro es hoy begins with music that seems to scream for help, without

explicitly saying so. A cry that soon becomes a topic during the screenings of

this documentary that portrays the daily life of a Havana still anchored in the

past and with an uncertain future, as seen through its seven protagonists. If La

nada contidiana (1995) written by Cuban exile Zoé Valdés (1959–) ref‌lected

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