A.N.S.W.E.R. Film Series
Thursday, September 7, 2006, 7:30 pm, $5
Fidel, an award-winning documentary by Cuban-American journalist, Estella Bravo, is a portrait of the Cuban leader. The film spans a period of 40 years of Castro’s rule from his early childhood and college days to his Presidency of Cuba and includes interviews with Harry Belafonte, Nelson Mandela, Alice Walker, Gabriel Garcia-Marquez, Sydney Pollock, and others. Rare footage shows him swimming with his bodyguards, working in the fields cutting sugar cane, visiting his childhood school and talking with Elian Gonzales, the six-year old boy who became a rallying point for Cuban exiles in Miami.
Released from prison after serving two years of a fifteen-year sentence, Castro took a ragtag army of volunteers and recruited farmers, women, and working people into the mountains to fight a decade-long guerilla war that led to the overthrow of American-backed Fulgencio Batista and his takeover of Cuba in 1959. 91min., 2001