Film Forum

(1968, Humberto Solás) Epic narrative of the 100 year struggle, told in three parts, and through three distinct genres – tragedy, melodrama, and comedy – with each episode following a different woman named Lucía, all of different classes, each one’s story an illustration of the stages of colonialism, neocolonialism, or socialist revolution. In 1895, the first Lucía is a member of the landed aristocracy, the second, in 1933, during the abortive revolution which led to the overthrow of Machado, is middle class, and the third, in the 1960s, is a rural peasant and member of an agricultural collective. At the time, the most ambitious (and expensive) movie produced by ICAIC (Cuban Institute of Cinematic Arts and Industry), with dazzling cinematography from Jorge Herrera, and a score by Leo Brouwer. In Spanish, with English subtitles. DCP restoration. Approx 160 min.

Restored by Cineteca di Bologna at L'Immagine Ritrovata laboratory in association with Instituto Cubano del Arte e Industria Cinematográficos (ICAIC). Restoration funded by Turner Classic Movies and The Foundation's World Cinema Project.

Reviews

“A TOUR DE FORCE CONSIDERED BY MANY AS CUBAN CINEMA’S PEAK ACCOMPLISHMENT.
 Lucía won first prize at the 1969 Moscow Film Festival, but because of the embargo against Cuba it did not open in the United States until 1974. While politically minded critics parsed the dialectical aspect of Solás’s shifting styles, mainstream reviewers were apt to pick out their favorite segment. Nora Sayre, who wrote on Lucía for The New York Times, was partial to the last, expressing a hope that it might be seen by ‘all the sexes,’ and praising it as ‘the best discussion of equality (and inequality) I’ve seen on screen.’”
– J. Hoberman, The New York Times

“One of the few films, Left or Right, to deal with women on the same plane and in the same breath as major historical events.”
– Molly Haskell