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Latin America’s Oldest Film Magazine
• Unique access to all issues of Cine Cubano that have ever been published in print (205 issues, 1960–2019)
• 18,921 digital pages (full color)
• Full-text search functionality
• Including MARC21 bibliographic records
• Part of our ongoing series The History of Latin American Cinema
• Scanned at the Cuban Institute of Cinematographic Art and Industry (ICAIC), Havana, Cuba
The journal Cine Cubano is an essential resource for studying the rich history of both Cuban revolutionary cinema and Latin American cinema at large, and is now made available online for the first time. The more than two hundred digital issues offer students and researchers unparalleled access to six decades of cutting-edge film theory, novel approaches to film making, and scores of film reviews.
Turbulent times
In June 1960, less than nineteen months after the establishment of Cuba's revolutionary government, the first issue of Cine Cubano was published. Despite the turbulent times, it had a print-run of 20,000 copies and was launched as a monthly. The cover featured a photograph of ‘Rebeldes,’ the second episode of the movie Historias de la Revolución, which at the time was yet to be released. The new journal would become the longest ongoing film magazine of Latin America and continues to be published until today.
Cine Cubano is the official organ of the Cuban Institute of Cinematographic Art and Industry (ICAIC). Enacted by law on March 24, 1959, ICAIC was the first cultural body founded by the new government. With its clear desire for rupture, the institute needed a medium to disseminate its ideas.
Point Zero
In the editorial to the inaugural issue of Cine Cubano, ICAIC founder Alfredo Guevara (1925–2013) states that “creating from a Point Zero is the first revolutionary action taken in the field of art.” He then proceeds to define the characteristics of the new Cuban cinema: quality, artistic, national, nonconformist, affordable, and commercially and technically accomplished. In this context, the pages of the magazine welcomed new creators who were trained on the job; others joined from Cine Club Visión and the Nuestro Tiempo cultural society. The new magazine attracted renowned writers such as the critic René Jordán of Bohemia magazine, the young Fausto Canel, contributor to the film magazine Cine Guía, Héctor García Mesa, soon to be founding director of the Cinemateca de Cuba, and the Spaniard José Miguel García Ascot, who pioneered the clapperboard in an ICAIC production. Throughout the years, the invaluable stillmen of the ICAIC contributed their photographs to the journal.
The longest-lived film publication in Latin America
More than sixty years have passed and Cine Cubano—despite varying its circulation, going through stages of irregular frequency, and ceasing publication twice (from mid-1974 to 1977 and from 1994 to 1997)—remains the longest-lived specialized film publication in Latin America. Its mission of integrating all the arts and give voice to the new Latin American cinema, a movement that was bursting with force, led the magazine at times to publish single-themed issues and, at other times, to ignore cinema altogether in favor of other art forms, such as the plastic arts.
It is noteworthy that in its first issues, Cine Cubano included the year and issue number, but later dispensed with this important piece of information. The first triple issue (23–25) deals with ICAIC itself and zooms in on the law that founded the institute. It also features texts about ICAIC’s different departments—the Cinemateca de Cuba, the cartoon department, and the ICAIC Latin American Newscast. It addition, it includes awards won by ICAIC until 1964 and interviews with the artistic staff. Issues 42–44 (1967) and 140 (1998) were published in Spanish and French.
Switch to online format
Since issue no. 134, Cine Cubano had a circulation of two thousand copies. As of issue no. 150 (2000), some significant changes were introduced, the main purpose of which was to devote more space to the cinema of all periods produced on the island, without foregoing reports on filming, interviews with filmmakers, and excerpts of scripts. Thanks to the boundless energy of Pablo Pacheco, who edited the journal from 2006 to 2019, Cine Cubano finally returned to its quarterly publication schedule. In 2020, the journal switched from a print to an online format. The present collection includes all 205 issues that have ever been published in print (1960–2019).
Luciano Castillo
Director, Cinemateca de Cuba
• 18,921 digital pages (full color)
• Full-text search functionality
• Including MARC21 bibliographic records
• Part of our ongoing series The History of Latin American Cinema
• Scanned at the Cuban Institute of Cinematographic Art and Industry (ICAIC), Havana, Cuba
The journal Cine Cubano is an essential resource for studying the rich history of both Cuban revolutionary cinema and Latin American cinema at large, and is now made available online for the first time. The more than two hundred digital issues offer students and researchers unparalleled access to six decades of cutting-edge film theory, novel approaches to film making, and scores of film reviews.
Turbulent times
In June 1960, less than nineteen months after the establishment of Cuba's revolutionary government, the first issue of Cine Cubano was published. Despite the turbulent times, it had a print-run of 20,000 copies and was launched as a monthly. The cover featured a photograph of ‘Rebeldes,’ the second episode of the movie Historias de la Revolución, which at the time was yet to be released. The new journal would become the longest ongoing film magazine of Latin America and continues to be published until today.
Cine Cubano is the official organ of the Cuban Institute of Cinematographic Art and Industry (ICAIC). Enacted by law on March 24, 1959, ICAIC was the first cultural body founded by the new government. With its clear desire for rupture, the institute needed a medium to disseminate its ideas.
Point Zero
In the editorial to the inaugural issue of Cine Cubano, ICAIC founder Alfredo Guevara (1925–2013) states that “creating from a Point Zero is the first revolutionary action taken in the field of art.” He then proceeds to define the characteristics of the new Cuban cinema: quality, artistic, national, nonconformist, affordable, and commercially and technically accomplished. In this context, the pages of the magazine welcomed new creators who were trained on the job; others joined from Cine Club Visión and the Nuestro Tiempo cultural society. The new magazine attracted renowned writers such as the critic René Jordán of Bohemia magazine, the young Fausto Canel, contributor to the film magazine Cine Guía, Héctor García Mesa, soon to be founding director of the Cinemateca de Cuba, and the Spaniard José Miguel García Ascot, who pioneered the clapperboard in an ICAIC production. Throughout the years, the invaluable stillmen of the ICAIC contributed their photographs to the journal.
The longest-lived film publication in Latin America
More than sixty years have passed and Cine Cubano—despite varying its circulation, going through stages of irregular frequency, and ceasing publication twice (from mid-1974 to 1977 and from 1994 to 1997)—remains the longest-lived specialized film publication in Latin America. Its mission of integrating all the arts and give voice to the new Latin American cinema, a movement that was bursting with force, led the magazine at times to publish single-themed issues and, at other times, to ignore cinema altogether in favor of other art forms, such as the plastic arts.
It is noteworthy that in its first issues, Cine Cubano included the year and issue number, but later dispensed with this important piece of information. The first triple issue (23–25) deals with ICAIC itself and zooms in on the law that founded the institute. It also features texts about ICAIC’s different departments—the Cinemateca de Cuba, the cartoon department, and the ICAIC Latin American Newscast. It addition, it includes awards won by ICAIC until 1964 and interviews with the artistic staff. Issues 42–44 (1967) and 140 (1998) were published in Spanish and French.
Switch to online format
Since issue no. 134, Cine Cubano had a circulation of two thousand copies. As of issue no. 150 (2000), some significant changes were introduced, the main purpose of which was to devote more space to the cinema of all periods produced on the island, without foregoing reports on filming, interviews with filmmakers, and excerpts of scripts. Thanks to the boundless energy of Pablo Pacheco, who edited the journal from 2006 to 2019, Cine Cubano finally returned to its quarterly publication schedule. In 2020, the journal switched from a print to an online format. The present collection includes all 205 issues that have ever been published in print (1960–2019).
Luciano Castillo
Director, Cinemateca de Cuba
Sources from the Cinemateca do Museu de Arte Moderna (MAM) in Rio de Janeiro; New York University Libraries; and four private collectors in Brazil
• Unique access to more than 60 magazines
• Fan magazines, trade magazines, Cinema Novo magazines
• Covering the period 1913–1974
• Ca. 75,000 full-color images
• Full-text search functionality
• MARC21 catalog records available
• Part of our ongoing series The History of Latin American Cinema
Brazilian cinema gained international acclaim through the Cinema Novo of Glauber Rocha, Nelson Pereira dos Santos and other directors in the 1960s. Yet Brazil produced numerous films throughout its various regions since as early as 1896. Until now, a proper appreciation of early Brazilian cinema has been hampered by the loss of a significant number of the films, as well as a lack of available printed sources pertaining to Brazil’s movie industry.
The present collection remedies this situation by providing easy online access to more than sixty Brazilian movie magazines, from the earliest ones published in the 1910s to later magazines covering the 1960s and early ‘70s. Many of them survive in only a few or even single copies and have not been available to researchers before. By bringing together film magazines from institutions and private collections in both Brazil and the United States, this collection dramatically increases the number of sources available to researchers interested in understanding the role of cinema in the largest country in Latin America.
Major transformations
The magazines in this collection not only shed a light on the history of Brazilian film — whose production periodically encountered great financial difficulties before it would expand again —, but also on the creation of both a market and a cinematographic culture in Brazil, strongly influenced by France until World War I, then dominated by Hollywood. In addition, the collection documents the major transformations that took place after World War II, when Brazilian audiences became increasingly familiar with films produced in other Latin American countries, as well as in Asia and Europe.
From Silent Period to Cinema Novo
By digitizing for the first time magazines on Brazilian cinema from the archives of the Cinemateca do Museu de Arte Moderna (MAM) in Rio de Janeiro, the Fales Library & Special Collections at New York University (NYU) and four private collectors in Brazil, this collection offers a unique source of a wide-ranging scope. From Portuguese magazines issued by the major Hollywood studios — Revista Universal (1921), Mensageiro Paramount (1926), Films (1926) by MGM, and Fox Revista (1927) — to highly influential publications from the Silent Period, such as Selecta (1915). The collection also contains trade magazines aimed at owners of movie theaters, which are little known and have virtually never been studied before, including O exhibidor (1927), Jornal do Exibidor (1938), Revista do Exibidor (1952) and O Exibidor (1955). Many publications not only address cinema, but also offer valuable material for the study of Brazilian theater, radio, and music, such as the influential Cine-Rádio Jornal (1938) or the corporate magazine Atividades Byington (1938). The collection also includes popular magazines read by (young) movie fans, such as Cine Revista (1938), Filmelândia (1951) and Cine Fan (1955). On the other hand, it documents the emergence of publications aimed at more sophisticated cinephiles, from the pioneering Filme (1949) to the influential Revista de Cultura Cinematográfica (1957). For the research of Cinema Novo films and filmmakers, little-known magazines from the early 1960s such as Cine Clube (1960) and A Tela Ilustrada (1961) are veritable gems.
Unknown even to experts
Major critics and filmmakers such as Pedro Lima, Alex Viany, Antonio Moniz Vianna, Vinícius de Moraes, Zenaide Andréa, Luiz Sérgio Person and Jean-Claude Bernardet appear in the pages of several magazines gathered in this collection, hitherto unknown even to experts. The breadth and diversity of this collection, which includes a number of short-lived publications, embody the richness and complexity of cinema in Brazilian society and culture; it will serve as an invaluable tool for historians, anthropologists, sociologists, designers, and many others.
Rafael de Luna Freire, Universidade Federal Fluminense
• Unique access to more than 60 magazines
• Fan magazines, trade magazines, Cinema Novo magazines
• Covering the period 1913–1974
• Ca. 75,000 full-color images
• Full-text search functionality
• MARC21 catalog records available
• Part of our ongoing series The History of Latin American Cinema
Brazilian cinema gained international acclaim through the Cinema Novo of Glauber Rocha, Nelson Pereira dos Santos and other directors in the 1960s. Yet Brazil produced numerous films throughout its various regions since as early as 1896. Until now, a proper appreciation of early Brazilian cinema has been hampered by the loss of a significant number of the films, as well as a lack of available printed sources pertaining to Brazil’s movie industry.
The present collection remedies this situation by providing easy online access to more than sixty Brazilian movie magazines, from the earliest ones published in the 1910s to later magazines covering the 1960s and early ‘70s. Many of them survive in only a few or even single copies and have not been available to researchers before. By bringing together film magazines from institutions and private collections in both Brazil and the United States, this collection dramatically increases the number of sources available to researchers interested in understanding the role of cinema in the largest country in Latin America.
Major transformations
The magazines in this collection not only shed a light on the history of Brazilian film — whose production periodically encountered great financial difficulties before it would expand again —, but also on the creation of both a market and a cinematographic culture in Brazil, strongly influenced by France until World War I, then dominated by Hollywood. In addition, the collection documents the major transformations that took place after World War II, when Brazilian audiences became increasingly familiar with films produced in other Latin American countries, as well as in Asia and Europe.
From Silent Period to Cinema Novo
By digitizing for the first time magazines on Brazilian cinema from the archives of the Cinemateca do Museu de Arte Moderna (MAM) in Rio de Janeiro, the Fales Library & Special Collections at New York University (NYU) and four private collectors in Brazil, this collection offers a unique source of a wide-ranging scope. From Portuguese magazines issued by the major Hollywood studios — Revista Universal (1921), Mensageiro Paramount (1926), Films (1926) by MGM, and Fox Revista (1927) — to highly influential publications from the Silent Period, such as Selecta (1915). The collection also contains trade magazines aimed at owners of movie theaters, which are little known and have virtually never been studied before, including O exhibidor (1927), Jornal do Exibidor (1938), Revista do Exibidor (1952) and O Exibidor (1955). Many publications not only address cinema, but also offer valuable material for the study of Brazilian theater, radio, and music, such as the influential Cine-Rádio Jornal (1938) or the corporate magazine Atividades Byington (1938). The collection also includes popular magazines read by (young) movie fans, such as Cine Revista (1938), Filmelândia (1951) and Cine Fan (1955). On the other hand, it documents the emergence of publications aimed at more sophisticated cinephiles, from the pioneering Filme (1949) to the influential Revista de Cultura Cinematográfica (1957). For the research of Cinema Novo films and filmmakers, little-known magazines from the early 1960s such as Cine Clube (1960) and A Tela Ilustrada (1961) are veritable gems.
Unknown even to experts
Major critics and filmmakers such as Pedro Lima, Alex Viany, Antonio Moniz Vianna, Vinícius de Moraes, Zenaide Andréa, Luiz Sérgio Person and Jean-Claude Bernardet appear in the pages of several magazines gathered in this collection, hitherto unknown even to experts. The breadth and diversity of this collection, which includes a number of short-lived publications, embody the richness and complexity of cinema in Brazilian society and culture; it will serve as an invaluable tool for historians, anthropologists, sociologists, designers, and many others.
Rafael de Luna Freire, Universidade Federal Fluminense
From the Archives of the Filmoteca of the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM)
• Number of images: ca. 40,000 (full color)
• MARC21 catalog records are available
• Part of our ongoing series The History of Latin American Cinema
• Location of originals: Filmoteca, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM)
Mexican cinema, from its beginnings in the late 1890s to its Golden Age (1930s to 1960), was consistently the largest and most important of all the Spanish-speaking countries. During its heyday, the Mexican film industry produced an average of one hundred films annually and supplied screen entertainment to both domestic audiences and international markets in Latin America, the United States, and Europe. The Golden Age of Mexican cinema is illuminated in this collection of popular movie periodicals. Not only does it include chief magazines such as Cinema Reporter (1943-1965) and Cine Mundial (1951-1955), it also features two extremely rare issues of El Cine Gráfico from 1935 and copies of the weekly El Mundo Ilustrado (1902-1910), an arts magazine that also contained notes on movies. The true extent of the popularity of Mexican film is illustrated by Cinelandia (1931-1947), which was published in Hollywood both in Spanish and in English. This collection also includes some fifty rare lobby cards, which were used to advertise a film. Finally, for the first time this collection gives access to the personal scrap book of Fernando de Fuentes (1894-1958), one of the leading Latin-American filmmakers to this day. It contains reviews, movie stills, programs, and advertisements, shedding a unique light on the career of this pioneering director.
The sources in this collection, heretofore only accessible in the archives of the Filmoteca de la UNAM in Mexico City, will be invaluable to researchers and students working on Film and Media Studies, Latin American Studies, and many other aspects of the historical, social, and political impact of cinema.
• MARC21 catalog records are available
• Part of our ongoing series The History of Latin American Cinema
• Location of originals: Filmoteca, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM)
Mexican cinema, from its beginnings in the late 1890s to its Golden Age (1930s to 1960), was consistently the largest and most important of all the Spanish-speaking countries. During its heyday, the Mexican film industry produced an average of one hundred films annually and supplied screen entertainment to both domestic audiences and international markets in Latin America, the United States, and Europe. The Golden Age of Mexican cinema is illuminated in this collection of popular movie periodicals. Not only does it include chief magazines such as Cinema Reporter (1943-1965) and Cine Mundial (1951-1955), it also features two extremely rare issues of El Cine Gráfico from 1935 and copies of the weekly El Mundo Ilustrado (1902-1910), an arts magazine that also contained notes on movies. The true extent of the popularity of Mexican film is illustrated by Cinelandia (1931-1947), which was published in Hollywood both in Spanish and in English. This collection also includes some fifty rare lobby cards, which were used to advertise a film. Finally, for the first time this collection gives access to the personal scrap book of Fernando de Fuentes (1894-1958), one of the leading Latin-American filmmakers to this day. It contains reviews, movie stills, programs, and advertisements, shedding a unique light on the career of this pioneering director.
The sources in this collection, heretofore only accessible in the archives of the Filmoteca de la UNAM in Mexico City, will be invaluable to researchers and students working on Film and Media Studies, Latin American Studies, and many other aspects of the historical, social, and political impact of cinema.
• More than 65,000 digital images
• From the Silent Era to the Revolution
• Press clippings, archival documents, lobby cards, and numerous unpublished photos
• Includes a full run of the weekly magazine Cinema, 1935–1965 (1,424 issues)
• Full-text search functionality
• Part of our ongoing series The History of Latin American Cinema
• Scanned from the originals kept at the Cinemateca de Cuba, Havana
Scanned at the Cinemateca de Cuba in Havana, Cuba, this online primary-source collection documents the history and development of Cuban cinema from the Silent Era to the Revolution. It offers unique access to unpublished photographs, newspaper clippings, lobby cards, yearbooks, and a complete run of the weekly magazine Cinema (1935–1965), an obligatory starting point for any research on early Cuban cinema.
Background
Mexican filmmaker Arturo Ripstein christened the century marked by the invention of the cinematograph by the Lumière brothers the “Century of Lumière.” The Frenchman Gabriel Veyre, an early adopter of the new technology, disembarked in the port of Havana on 15 January 1897. Already on the 24th, he was showing moving images to a stunned audience. It had the same profound impact on Cuba as it had elsewhere. Barely three years later, the new century began, in which the “music of light”, as the French filmmaker Abel Gance called cinema, would reach its peak.
This online collection, aimed at researchers and students as well as cinephiles, comprises documents that record the development of cinema in Cuba between 1902, the year the Cuban Republic was declared, and 1958, when President Fulgencio Batista was ousted by Fidel Castro and his revolutionaries. This period is commonly referred to as the Republican Era. As the documents in the collection show, Cuba’s film industry never really became an industry, despite the best efforts of a few dreamers, as the Cuban film historian Arturo Agramonte called those who devoted themselves to it. The collection includes valuable photographs—many of them unpublished—as well as historical film magazines, yearbooks, lobby cards, and clippings from the press of the time. They have been collected and preserved by the Cinemateca de Cuba since its foundation on 6 February 1960 by the Cuban Institute of Cinematographic Art and Industry (ICAIC), which itself was founded in March 1959, only a few months after the Revolution.
The organization of the collection allows researchers to study the people who tried to make films rather than the films they succeeded in making, and also to access the material by topic. The cinema produced in this period lived and died with each production company that was founded to carry out a project, many of them unsuccessful and others with insufficient distribution, which negatively impacted their ability to recoup their investment.
Agramonte-Castillo collection
Another valuable component to this online resource is the Agramonte-Castillo collection, which was compiled in the first half of the twentieth century by cameraman-turned-historian Arturo Agramonte García (1925–2003). This collection contains biographical information from various sources on producers, directors, distributors and other people involved in the film industry. It formed the basis for Agramonte’s monumental Cronología del cine Cubano, which was published in four volumes between 2011 and 2016 and was co-written by the author of this introduction text.
Cinema magazine
Included in this collection is a complete run of the weekly magazine Cinema. The appearance of its first issue on 1 December 1935 was the most notorious event in Cuba’s otherwise arid film scene of the mid-1930s. Its director was the Madrid-born Enrique Perdices Yubero (1901–1979), who lived in Havana. Together with his brother Antonio, he worked on the monthly publication Civilización, the official organ of the Asociación Nacional de Exhibidores, which was also founded in 1935. Enrique Perdices, a film buff from a young age, was involved in the production of several films until he joined Antonio and Ramón Peón in the important B.P.P. Pictures Company, where he became the executive producer of two feature films: El veneno de un beso (1929) and La Virgen de la Caridad (1930), directed by the pioneer Ramón Peón. After B.P.P. Pictures closed its business, Perdices began to devote himself to cinema through journalism.
One of a kind
Cinema, initially published as a supplement to Civilización, was priced at five cents and promoted as “one of a kind.” Its offices were at Calle Gervasio no. 118, altos, in Central Havana. Its editor-in-chief was Antonio Suárez Gómez. The cover of the first issue showed a photograph of the leading couple of the Spanish film Vidas rotas (1935), which was to premiere on 10 December at the Campoamor theater. The Film Criticism section was edited by the photographer Ricardo Delgado, who, among other films, reviewed Alas sobre el Chaco (1935), directed by Christy Cabanne for Universal Pictures. María M. Garrett, appointed Cinema’s New York correspondent, sent in reports on Hollywood show business, while Ramón Peón dispatched his contributions from Mexico.
Cinema, which became the official organ of the Unión Nacional de Empresarios de Cuba, is the only publication of its kind in Cuba with an uninterrupted circulation for three decades. The magazine paid constant attention to the many initiatives to launch a national film industry, which was ignited with each new film produced, only to peter out again later.
Obligatory starting point
To consult the entire Cinema collection is to trace the history of Cuban cinema step by step, from its most hesitant or misguided efforts to the more firm and promising ones. Cinema is an obligatory starting point for any research on early Cuban cinema. An examination of the 1,424 issues published up to August 1965 is to go through, week by week, a history full of lights and shadows. In his editorial column Son cosas nuestras, Perdices always showed an unabated generosity in the promotion of Cuban films. From the inaugural issue onward he undertook a crusade to engage successive governments of the Republic in supporting a national film industry, which so many dreamers aspired to but never achieved.
During all this time, innumerable film publications appeared in Cuba, almost all of them short lived. Only Cinema was able to maintain its publication schedule week after week for thirty years. We owe this immeasurable treasure to the tenacity of Enrique Perdices, who brought together a group of like-minded collaborators, and, above all, to his overflowing passion for a genuine national cinema.
Luciano Castillo, Director, Cinemateca de Cuba
• From the Silent Era to the Revolution
• Press clippings, archival documents, lobby cards, and numerous unpublished photos
• Includes a full run of the weekly magazine Cinema, 1935–1965 (1,424 issues)
• Full-text search functionality
• Part of our ongoing series The History of Latin American Cinema
• Scanned from the originals kept at the Cinemateca de Cuba, Havana
Scanned at the Cinemateca de Cuba in Havana, Cuba, this online primary-source collection documents the history and development of Cuban cinema from the Silent Era to the Revolution. It offers unique access to unpublished photographs, newspaper clippings, lobby cards, yearbooks, and a complete run of the weekly magazine Cinema (1935–1965), an obligatory starting point for any research on early Cuban cinema.
Background
Mexican filmmaker Arturo Ripstein christened the century marked by the invention of the cinematograph by the Lumière brothers the “Century of Lumière.” The Frenchman Gabriel Veyre, an early adopter of the new technology, disembarked in the port of Havana on 15 January 1897. Already on the 24th, he was showing moving images to a stunned audience. It had the same profound impact on Cuba as it had elsewhere. Barely three years later, the new century began, in which the “music of light”, as the French filmmaker Abel Gance called cinema, would reach its peak.
This online collection, aimed at researchers and students as well as cinephiles, comprises documents that record the development of cinema in Cuba between 1902, the year the Cuban Republic was declared, and 1958, when President Fulgencio Batista was ousted by Fidel Castro and his revolutionaries. This period is commonly referred to as the Republican Era. As the documents in the collection show, Cuba’s film industry never really became an industry, despite the best efforts of a few dreamers, as the Cuban film historian Arturo Agramonte called those who devoted themselves to it. The collection includes valuable photographs—many of them unpublished—as well as historical film magazines, yearbooks, lobby cards, and clippings from the press of the time. They have been collected and preserved by the Cinemateca de Cuba since its foundation on 6 February 1960 by the Cuban Institute of Cinematographic Art and Industry (ICAIC), which itself was founded in March 1959, only a few months after the Revolution.
The organization of the collection allows researchers to study the people who tried to make films rather than the films they succeeded in making, and also to access the material by topic. The cinema produced in this period lived and died with each production company that was founded to carry out a project, many of them unsuccessful and others with insufficient distribution, which negatively impacted their ability to recoup their investment.
Agramonte-Castillo collection
Another valuable component to this online resource is the Agramonte-Castillo collection, which was compiled in the first half of the twentieth century by cameraman-turned-historian Arturo Agramonte García (1925–2003). This collection contains biographical information from various sources on producers, directors, distributors and other people involved in the film industry. It formed the basis for Agramonte’s monumental Cronología del cine Cubano, which was published in four volumes between 2011 and 2016 and was co-written by the author of this introduction text.
Cinema magazine
Included in this collection is a complete run of the weekly magazine Cinema. The appearance of its first issue on 1 December 1935 was the most notorious event in Cuba’s otherwise arid film scene of the mid-1930s. Its director was the Madrid-born Enrique Perdices Yubero (1901–1979), who lived in Havana. Together with his brother Antonio, he worked on the monthly publication Civilización, the official organ of the Asociación Nacional de Exhibidores, which was also founded in 1935. Enrique Perdices, a film buff from a young age, was involved in the production of several films until he joined Antonio and Ramón Peón in the important B.P.P. Pictures Company, where he became the executive producer of two feature films: El veneno de un beso (1929) and La Virgen de la Caridad (1930), directed by the pioneer Ramón Peón. After B.P.P. Pictures closed its business, Perdices began to devote himself to cinema through journalism.
One of a kind
Cinema, initially published as a supplement to Civilización, was priced at five cents and promoted as “one of a kind.” Its offices were at Calle Gervasio no. 118, altos, in Central Havana. Its editor-in-chief was Antonio Suárez Gómez. The cover of the first issue showed a photograph of the leading couple of the Spanish film Vidas rotas (1935), which was to premiere on 10 December at the Campoamor theater. The Film Criticism section was edited by the photographer Ricardo Delgado, who, among other films, reviewed Alas sobre el Chaco (1935), directed by Christy Cabanne for Universal Pictures. María M. Garrett, appointed Cinema’s New York correspondent, sent in reports on Hollywood show business, while Ramón Peón dispatched his contributions from Mexico.
Cinema, which became the official organ of the Unión Nacional de Empresarios de Cuba, is the only publication of its kind in Cuba with an uninterrupted circulation for three decades. The magazine paid constant attention to the many initiatives to launch a national film industry, which was ignited with each new film produced, only to peter out again later.
Obligatory starting point
To consult the entire Cinema collection is to trace the history of Cuban cinema step by step, from its most hesitant or misguided efforts to the more firm and promising ones. Cinema is an obligatory starting point for any research on early Cuban cinema. An examination of the 1,424 issues published up to August 1965 is to go through, week by week, a history full of lights and shadows. In his editorial column Son cosas nuestras, Perdices always showed an unabated generosity in the promotion of Cuban films. From the inaugural issue onward he undertook a crusade to engage successive governments of the Republic in supporting a national film industry, which so many dreamers aspired to but never achieved.
During all this time, innumerable film publications appeared in Cuba, almost all of them short lived. Only Cinema was able to maintain its publication schedule week after week for thirty years. We owe this immeasurable treasure to the tenacity of Enrique Perdices, who brought together a group of like-minded collaborators, and, above all, to his overflowing passion for a genuine national cinema.
Luciano Castillo, Director, Cinemateca de Cuba
A set of online primary-source collections documenting the history of Latin American cinema