Cannes

Alex Deleon <filmfestivals.com>

Memories of Underdevelopment, 1968.

Director, Tomas Gutierrez Alea: restored B/w print from Cineteca di Bologna with introduction by Martin Scorcese on the tricky restoration process.

Stars Sergio Corrieri and Daisy Granados as the good looking lovers of the tale. Landmark Cuban film set in Havana between 1961 when many Cubans fled the country after the Fidel Castro led communist takeover and the Missile Crisis of late 1962 --in between the failed Bay of Pigs invasion.  Against this backdrop of pivotal events the film follows the adventures and misadventures of a handsome divorced man of 38, Sergio, who chose not to leave because he owned property and was not politically involved in the revolution. His seduction of and affair with an attractive seventeen year old girl, Elena, becomes the focal point of the narrative leading up to a trial when he drops her and is accused of rape and breach of promise by her family but acquitted by the court.  

All throughout the tale he makes wry observations on the state of underdevelopment of the newly communized island country and the lack of culture of his youthful girlfriend. 

One long section covers a visit to Hemingway's Cuban home with satiric comments on his obsession with big game hunting. The narrator remarks that the macho American author only killed animals to keep from killing himself -- which eventually he did. 

During the missile crisis we hear a lengthy clip of president Kennedy's voice describing in detail the threat to the hemisphere posed by Russian nuclear weaponry on the island.and the need to do whatever is necessary to squelch this threat. Along the way we are treated to a remarkable clip of the young bearded Fidel Castro in one of his fiery speeches enjoining the Cuban people not to be intimidated by the American colossus to the north as we see Russian tankers being unloaded in Habana.

This first big film from Communist Cuba was both a savvy critique of the new hammer and sickle order and a cunning portrait of Cuban society at this crucial historical juncture. Aside from its historical importance and near documentary feel Alea's picture works extremely well simply as a thorny love story and the drama of an attractive middle aged man caught up in political events above and beyond his control. Memories of Underdevelopment opened the door and set the tone for the development of a small but feisty and colorful Cuban film industry, one of the best in Latin America, which continues to turn out interesting movies right up to the present day.

This was followed by the latest offering from the best known Iranian director, Asghar Farhadi, whose brilliant family drama, "A Separation" won he foreign language Academy Award in 2014.

His new film, "Forushande" (The Salesman) presented here in the Director's fortnight, is an extreme shaggy dog story that is not going to inspire anything but yawns and seat squirming. Sharply lensed as are all Iranian films these days and earnestly acted, this is a tedious story about a married couple involved in a small theater production in Teheran of Arthur Millers Death of a Salesman. They have to move into a makeshift apartment when the building where they originally lived collapses at the beginning of the picture.

The apartment they temporarily take over belonged to a prostitute, it turns out, who received her clientele there.

One night a regular client of hers comes up for some fun and games but is so disappointed to find the actress wife there instead of the whore he desires that he clubs her over the head from behind and sends her to the hospital. She is now in a state of constant fear because she didn't actually see her assailant, is too ashamed to make a police report, and fears he may return. 

The rest of the picture is devoted to the devoted husband's tracking down of the unknown man who messed his wife up so badly. Dirty Harry he is not and his vengeance when he finds

his man will get very lumpy to say the least. This is the kind of picture that gets more and more boring as it trudges along to an unsatisfying conclusion for two hours but keeps you from walking out only because you want to find out who the mysterious attacker was -- and then it leads to a lengthy lethargic letdown, the point perhaps being that vengeance isn't always worth the effort it takes. Well, even monkeys sometimes fall from trees.