Cuban Studies

Filmed in Cuba over the course of ten years, Los Últimos Frikis tells the story of iconic Cuban heavy metal band Zeus and their three-decade fight to be heard. As Cuba’s political and social climate once again shifts the band embarks on a national tour across the island to defend their cultural impact and livelihood.

When a young Fidel Castro rescued his friend, Father Llorente, from drowning, he said it was a miracle and prayed to the Virgin Mary. Gabriel Garcia Marquez once gave Castro a copy of Stoker's Dracula which kept him up all night. A witty, engaging collection of personal anecdotes offers new insight into the Cuban leader.

With unprecedented access to Cubans on both sides of the Florida Straits, Cuba: A Lifetime of Passion looks at the extant reality of the Cuban Revolution and its uncertain post-Castro future.

From Buena Vista Social Club to Hollywood blockbusters, Havana's crumbling architecture has been romanticized in countless movies. But what about the people who must live in these buildings? A unique thought-provoking portrait of Havana's inhabited ruins and their curious blend of magic and decay.

Since 1962 the United States has imposed an economic, commercial and financial embargo on Cuba. Bloqueo examines its effects, the reasons for its implementation, and why it has endured for so many decades.

Profiles the Cuban Revolution and Fidel Castro at political middle age. The Cuban leader reflects on his life and Cuba — past, present and future — and declares his continuing faith in communism.

This controversial documentary looks at Cuba's future from the outspoken and dynamic perspective of Cuban youth. Interviews and spontaneous, street corner debates are interwoven with rarely seen views of Cuban youth culture. The result is an unprecedented view of a critical moment in Cuban history and Cuban/U.S. relations.

Examines the continuing human tragedy of families divided as a result of the thirty year conflict between the U.S. and Cuba.

This beautifully photographed video gives a rare (for Americans) view of Cuba. Apart from its current economic crisis as an embattled socialist government, it is also an undeniably beautiful Caribbean island which current U.S. laws prevent most American tourists from visiting.

The Cuban Excludables is about the thousands of Cuban detainees held in prisons throughout the U.S. With no due process or legal redress, some of them spent years behind bars and cannot be sent back to Cuba by INS due to lack of agreements between the US and Cuba. These Cuban 'excludables' are thus in a legal limbo that leaves them imprisoned indefinitely.

This video chronicles the 1998 return to Cuba of an American college professor, Dr. Magaly Lavendenz, forced as a child to leave Cuba in 1962, and who grew up in the U.S., but with a distinct Cuban identity.

This four-part series examines changes in Cuban society during the post-Soviet economic crisis between 1994-98.

In 1975, the first Cuban soldiers went to Angola to help defend that newly independent government from invasion by South African troops. After nearly fourteen years of bitter conflict, the Angolan War ended, Namibia was established as an independent state, and Cuban and South African troops have returned home. Filmed on location in Angola, South Africa and Cuba, this documentary examines the politics of the war from both sides and features remarkable combat footage, archival material and interviews with Cuban and South African soldiers as well as grieving families of those who died in the war.

This video portrait of John "Bob" Stockwell, the son of Protestant missionaries, a former Marine Corps officer and corporate manager, reveals the planning and shaping of a CIA covert operation by focusing on his efforts to overthrow the newly-installed MPLA government in Angola in 1975.

Examines the feasibility, illegality and political implications of TV Marti, a U.S. government broadcast service beamed into Cuba by way of an intricate satellite and weather balloon link-up in clear contravention of international law and broadcast regulations.

A fast-paced overview of the events, issues and personalities of the decade, including the assassinations of two Kennedys and Martin Luther King, Jr.; the Beatles; space exploration; a confrontation in Cuba; and U.S. involvement in Vietnam.

Malcolm X; bomb shelters; Cuban missile crisis and threat of nuclear confrontation; JFK vs. the steel companies; James Meredith goes to school; Thalidomide tragedy; Seattle World's Fair; Marilyn Monroe dies.

This video examines the educational system in Cuba, visiting a preschool, elementary school, middle school, a boarding school for special education students, a ballet academy and a sports academy.

Examines the worldwide crisis in teenage pregnancies through four case studies of teenage mothers in Ghana, England, Cuba, and the U.S., thereby providing a cross-cultural survey of the underlying reasons for the increasing rate of adolescent pregnancies and also discussing the hazards to the health and well-being of such young mothers.