The Cinema of Sara Gómez: Reframing Revolution

441 Pages·2021·5.421 MB·English

by  Susan Lord (editor), María Caridad Cumaná (editor)

THE CINEMA OF SARA GÓMEZ
Sara Gómez, circa 1964. ©️ ICAIC
New Directions in National Cinemas
Robert Rushing, editor
THE CINEMA OF
SARA GÓMEZ
REFRAMING REVOLUTION
Q
Edited by
Susan Lord and María Caridad Cumaná with
Víctor Fowler Calzada
Indiana University Press
This book is a publication of
Indiana University Press
Office of Scholarly Publishing
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1320 East 10th Street
Bloomington, Indiana 47405 USA
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©️ 2021 by Indiana University Press
All rights reserved
No part of this book may be reproduced or utilized in any form or by any
means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying and recording, or
by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing
from the publisher. The paper used in this publication meets the minimum
requirements of the American National Standard for Information Sciences—
Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI Z39.48-1992.
Manufactured in the United States of America
First printing 2021
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Lord, Susan, 1959- editor. | Cumaná, María Caridad, 1964- editor. |
Fowler Calzada, Víctor, 1960- other.
Title: The cinema of Sara Gómez : reframing revolution / edited by Susan
Lord and María Caridad Cumaná with Víctor Fowler Calzada.
Description: Bloomington, Indiana : Indiana University Press, [2021] |
Series: New directions in national cinemas | Includes bibliographical
references, filmography, and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2020047890 (print) | LCCN 2020047891 (ebook) | ISBN
9780253057044 (hardback) | ISBN 9780253057051 (paperback) | ISBN
9780253057068 (ebook)
Subjects: LCSH: Gómez Yera, Sara—Criticism and interpretation. | Motion
pictures—Cuba—History—20th century. | Documentary
films—Cuba—History and criticism. | Women motion picture producers and
directors—Cuba—Biography. | Women, Black—Cuba—Biography.
Classification: LCC PN1998.3.G37343 C56 2021 (print) | LCC PN1998.3.G37343
(ebook) | DDC 791.4302/33092—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020047890
LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020047891
CONTENTS
Acknowledgments vii
Introduction: New Women, Old Worlds / Susan Lord 1
1. “We Have a Vast Public” / Interview for Pensamiento Crítico by
Sara Gómez Yera 32
2. “Sara Is So Very Sara!” / Inés María Martiatu Terry Interviewed
by Lourdes Martínez-Echazábal 35
3. Inquisitive Gazes: Sara Gómez’s Perspectives on Social
Marginality from and within the Cuban Revolution /
Odette Casamayor-Cisneros 58
4. Sergio Giral Interviewed by María Caridad Cumaná 80
5. Neither Farms nor Coffee Plantations: Urban Spaces and
Cultural Contours in the Script and on the Screen /
Víctor Fowler Calzada 87
6. Residential Miraflores (Script for De cierta manera / One way
or another) / Sara Gómez Yera and Tomás González 123
7. Luis García Mesa Interviewed by Lourdes Martínez-Echazábal
and María Caridad Cumaná 181
8. Sara Gómez: AfroCubana (Afro-Cuban Women’s) Activism
after 1961 / Devyn Spence Benson 223
9. Racial Identity and Collisions: Gómez and Guillén Landrián /
María Caridad Cumaná 251
10. Rigoberto López Interviewed by Víctor Fowler Calzada 260
11. Information and Education: Sara Gómez and Nonfiction Film
Culture of the 1960s / Joshua Malitsky 270
vi Contents
12. Virtual Heroes in the Midst of Shortage: Sara Gómez
Confronts the New Man / Ana Serra 287
13. Iván Arocha Montes de Oca Interviewed by Ricardo
Acosta 306
Illustrated Essay: Rumba by Sara Gomez 317
14. Sabor and Punctum: Music in Sara Gómez’s Films /
Alan West-Durán 328
15. The Santiago of Two Pilgrims: F. G. Lorca and Sara Gómez in
Search of Eastern Cuba / Lourdes Martínez-Echazábal 341
16. Her Contribution / Sandra Abd’Allah-Alvarez Ramírez 362
17. Conclusion: Transculturation, Gender, and Documentary /
Susan Lord 372
Epilogue: “As Time Goes By, We Are Less of a Polite, Aesthetic,
Static, Sexual, and Passive Object” / Sara Gómez Yera
Interviewed by Marguerite Duras 395
Filmography 403
Index 417
Acknowledgments
The story of this collection of texts about Sara Gómez could be compared to
the long return of Ulysses to his birth home in Ithaca. More than ten years have
passed since the project began, and some of those who contributed are, alas, no
longer with us: Inés María Martiatu Terry (“Lalita,” 1942–2013) and Rigoberto
López (1947–2019). We still feel the loss of Julio García Espinosa (1926–2016),
who was an early supporter of this project and of Sara. Still, I believe it was
worth waiting for this concert of dissimilar voices to usher in the light, reeling
from documentary and fictional work that, at the time it was filmed, envisioned
the future and continues to provide inspiration for tomorrow.
The singularity of Sara’s films is uncovered in the research of each of the
authors as they examine and interpret the themes exposed in her films. Sara’s
legacy should establish a starting point for a larger study of the contributions
of women filmmakers within the context of Cuban audiovisual productions
after 1959.
I want to thank my mother, María Antonia González, who continues to gift
my life with a shining light, a light that emanates from women like her, who
inspired and created a singular space on the big screen, through the work of
Sara Gómez.
—María Caridad Cumaná
In 1992 at the Euclid in Toronto, Ontario, Sara Gómez’s documentaries saw the
light of a projector—some for the very first time, all on videotape with wonky
subtitles. This project was inspired by that event, programmed by Ricardo
Acosta and David MacIntosh. It changed my life in ways I could not have imag-
ined at the time. I anticipated that researchers with more preparation than I had
in matters of Cuban and Latin American cinema would take on this project.
Several years later, in Havana, Gloria Rolando took my hand, became my friend,
and gave me encouragement, advice, and introductions. A project that started,
naively, as a single-author monograph became a rich and complex montage of
vii
viii Acknowledgments
voices, perspectives, arguments, memories, and hope thanks to my coeditor
María Caridad. It became clear that Sara’s legacy deserved much more that I
could honor alone. We called Caridad la llave, the key, because she held the con-
fidence of so many in the ICIAC and the world of Cuban cinema. And thanks
to her, the project was launched in the form it has taken. Víctor Fowler found
the script of De cierta manera entitled Residential Miraflores and supported the
project in many ways. And the women of the colloquium “Sara Gómez, imagen
múltiple: El audiovisual cubano desde una perspectiva de género” in Havana
in 2006 have kept working on Sara, encouraging and pushing for this project
to see the page: they are Sandra del Valle, Sandra Abd’Allah-Alvarez Ramírez,
Karen Rodríguez López-Nussa, Norma Guillard, and Danae C. Diéguez. At the
ICAIC, Luciano Castillo, Lola Calviño, Katy Casanova, and the late Pablo Pa-
checo offered advice, archives, and permissions with enthusiasm and kindness.
Sara’s children, Iddia Veitía Gómez and Ibis Hernández Gómez, gave us
encouragement and permission. This book is dedicated to their brother, Sara’s
and Germinal Hernández’s son, the musician Alfredo Hernández Gómez, who
passed away in 2013.
The numerous and seemingly endless stops and starts on this journey are
due, in part, to the ever unfolding possibilities of contributors, documents,
images, interviews, translations, and commentaries. The contributors to this
book deserve all our gratitude for their wisdom, patience, and support. Nearly
every article, interview, and document required translation. Helen Dixon,
Joan Donaghey, Paul Kelley, Miguel Ángel Pérez, and Zaira Zarza did tre-
mendous work translating and advising as I worked through the texts with
the authors, copy editors, transcribers, and proofreaders. Tim Pearson is an
extraordinary editor—he helped get through the first five hundred pages with
a sharp eye and good humor. Freddy Monasterio Barso, Shawn Newman, May
Chew, Jessica Jacobson-Konefall, Ozlem Atar, and Xenia Reloba de la Cruz all
pushed this along with intelligence and hard work. A special thanks to Xenia
for the professional, painstaking work with the index. The next generation of
care for the work of Sara Gómez is happening as this book goes to press, with
the digitization and subtitling of Sara’s documentaries in our Vulnerable Media
Lab, thanks to Dairon Luis Morejón Pérez, Melissa Noventa, and Michelle
O’Halloran.
Thank you to the seemingly infinite patience from the people at Indiana Uni-
versity Press, including Allison Chaplin, Robert Rushing, Janice Frisch, Carol
McGillivray, and Lesley Bolton. And special thanks to the two reviewers who
helped put new wind under our sails with suggestions and positive remarks.
Acknowledgments ix
The research for this book was undertaken with the financial support of the
Social Science and Humanities Research Council of Canada.
Over the years, friends in Havana have offered loving support and
laughter—and flan. Those individuals include Mirta Carreras Díaz, Emilia
Fernández, Inés and Olguita Rodríguez, Dannys Montes de Oca Moreda,
Laura Cisneros, Manuel Piña, Lourdes Pérez Montalvo y la familia de calle 17,
Omar Morejón Guerra, Jorge León Sanz, Vanessa Chicolo, Aldo Peña, Joel del
Río, and Marta Díaz. During many evenings over many years, Karen Dubinsky,
Susan Belyea, Jordi Belyea Dubinsky, Scott Rutherford, Sayyida Jaffer, Mary
Caesar, and Dorit Naaman have listened to my hopes and fears for this project
here in Kingston and on the balconies of Havana. And thank you to Paul Kelley
and Kurt Kelley-Lord for keeping me fed and loved all the way.
—Susan Lord