Press: "Failure" is a long and chaotic collapse, and we can hardly even expect it to bring about a black and white binary situation with a little kindness. In most cases, individuals in the "failure" can only make spontaneous choices within a very limited range under the surging waves, which breeds many ambiguous liminal spaces. Set in the context of the Cuban political crisis in the early 1960s, Memories of the Underdeveloped, the protagonist Sergio wanders the streets of turbulent Havana, muffled and muffled by the sting of a personal existential crisis. changes in the social situation. This Sunday, we will enjoy one of the most important works in the history of Cuban cinema, gaining another possibility to look at "failure" in the interwoven visual material.
The Fog of the Interstitial: Existential Disaffection in Alea's Memories of Underdevelopment Translated by Chadwick Jenkins | , edited and proofread by shun | Wang Zhuxin, shun *Note: This translation has deleted the last paragraph of the original text about the introduction of the CC repaired version of "Memories of Low Development". The length of this article is 6850 words, and it takes 12 minutes to read in Thomas Gutierrez In Tomás Gutiérrez Alea's film, the protagonist is a resident alienated from his own country, a traveler too familiar with his surroundings to experience fleeting surprises.
On January 1, 1959, Cuban President Fulgencio Batista fled the Cuban border, announcing the surrender of Cuba to the guerrillas led by Fidel Castro . Castro has taken over a country mired in political corruption, thwarted by mob gangs and controlled by U.S. business interests (roughly 75 percent of arable land is owned by foreign entities). Even more shocking is the fact that almost no Cuban has any formal education, infrastructure (most importantly, water supply) is inadequate, and unemployment is rampant. Apartheid has also deeply torn Cuban society, women have very limited rights guaranteed by law, and many Cubans suffer from severe lack of housing and medical care. Immediately after taking office, Castro implemented a series of reforms aimed at improving Cuba's plight: nationalizing land, closing gangster casinos, and addressing women's rights and racial inequality. But at the same time, he has summarily executed many of Batista's followers without due process of law, confiscated the private property of a group of wealthy Cuban citizens, expelled the Roman Catholic Church, and instituted repressive measures to prevent the overthrow of his regime. , including the establishment of a network of espionage (Informant Committees for the Defense of the Revolution); these measures have left thousands of Cubans who feel disenfranchised or directly threatened by Castro's policies fled Cuba. Castro also sought cultural means to strengthen his revolutionary government among the people, and shortly after taking power, his regime created the Dirección de Cultura del Ejército Rebelde (Ministry of Culture of the Rebel Army). Under this unidentified institution was established a film department, which by March 1959 became the "Association of Cuban Cinematic Arts and Industries (ICAIC)." The institution was established by a law (the first law on culture passed by a revolutionary government) that declared film to be "the most powerful and provocative form of artistic expression, and the greatest source of public education and the dissemination of ideas. Direct and popular carrier" . This ushered in the so-called "Golden Age of Cuban Cinema" for about a decade. ICAIC was established to produce, distribute and exhibit Cuban films as a means of educating the general public; film is a mass art, which means that it is not only for public consumption, but also for political solidarity and development measures. The agency's early films were mostly documentaries, chronicling the ambitions and achievements of the revolution; two of the most important were "Our Land" (Esta tierra nuestra , Tomas Gutierrez Allai, 1959) and La vivienda (Julio García Espinosa, 1959). In this regard, ICAIC appears to have become a tool of propaganda - and Castro's infamous statement in 1961 on the "role of creative expression in the new Cuba" confirmed this suspicion. , "Everything belongs to the revolution; outside the revolution, nothing is known." In fact, many directors, convinced that their creations would inevitably be censored in such a regime, either chose to go into exile, or went into exile due to various controversies. lost their place in the ICAIC.
However, Memorias del Subdesarrollo ( Memorias del Subdesarrollo ), directed by Tomas Gutierrez Allai in 1968) — based on the novel of the same name by Edmundo Desnoes, who also co-wrote the screenplay — illustrates that ICAIC releases don’t necessarily lack conscious critiques. On the contrary, whether the restrictions are loose or strict, ICAIC offers artists the opportunity to create a new class of critical cinema - one that publicly denounces neocolonialism and its capitalist substructure, while not glorifying revolution and ignoring ongoing The inequalities that exist do not deny the real suffering (deserved or unprovoked) suffered by those who were previously in power, even when the Castro regime was ostensibly on the same side of the deprived. This is Cuba's answer to the "Third Cinema", a revolutionary film driven by the image of the author-director, trying to carve out a "First Cinema" different from the Hollywood model and a "Second Cinema" in the European art world different spaces. However, Gutierrez Allai was highly critical of the concept of "author-director", and he sought a collaborative model for his approach to filmmaking - one that not only involved a dedicated staff, but also It encompasses a form of work that straddles the distinction between film genres, the division between high art and popular art, and the difference between creative content and ready-made material. Therefore, "Underdeveloped Memories" has become a film with a simple narrative, but rich in political, existential philosophical, and aesthetic themes; the plot design is simple, but the organization is complex; the film faces the complexity of political nodes. Sexuality, without reducing this complexity into a simple work of propaganda moral education. The film's political juncture is the period between the "Bay of Pigs" (April 1961) invasion of Cuba by a U.S.-backed Cuban exile group and the Cuban Missile Crisis (October 1962). The "Bay of Pigs Incident" refers to a failed U.S. invasion of the Cuban revolutionary government led by Fidel Castro on April 17, 1961. This operation was planned by the CIA and marked the first U.S. anti-Cuba operation. a peak and catalyzed the subsequent Cuban Missile Crisis]. At this time, Castro had just taken power, and the national situation was turbulent. The "Bay of Pigs Incident" proves that Cuba is still so vulnerable, and also shows that the mere imposition of a trade embargo against Cuba cannot dispel the dissatisfaction of the United States. A new wave of great exodus followed; Cubans who were unsure of Castro's ability to withstand the might of the United States abandoned the country. At the same time, many of those who stayed saw Castro as a national hero: the bearded messiah, outraged and willing to stand up against the forces of capitalism and the new colonial powers. Che Guevara even wrote a letter of thanks to President Kennedy: "Thanks to the Bay of Pigs. Before this invasion, the revolution was fragile. Now it's stronger than ever." Although Castro Having previously refused to label the Cuban revolution "communist", he now declares it to be "Marxist-Leninist" in nature and is increasingly aligned with the Soviet Union. He soon struck a deal with Soviet Prime Minister Nikita Khrushchev to transfer nuclear weapons from the Soviet Union to Cuba, within arm's reach of the United States, thereby triggering the Cuban Missile Crisis; many believe ( Many historians still see it this way) This was the freezing point of the Cold War, when the world's precarious balance of power was on the verge of collapse in a sudden global catastrophe and destruction. To say this was a bloody day in Cuban life would be almost an understatement. Cuban society oscillates between national pride and a newfound self-confidence on one side and existential fear and fatal apprehension on the other. Khrushchev) reached an agreement to transfer nuclear weapons from the Soviet Union to Cuba, within arm's reach of the United States, thus triggering the Cuban Missile Crisis; what many believe (and many historians still see it) this was the freezing point of the Cold War, when At that moment, the world's precarious balance of power nearly collapsed in a sudden global catastrophe and destruction. To say this was a bloody day in Cuban life would be almost an understatement. Cuban society oscillates between national pride and a newfound self-confidence on one side and existential fear and fatal apprehension on the other. Khrushchev) reached an agreement to transfer nuclear weapons from the Soviet Union to Cuba, within arm's reach of the United States, thus triggering the Cuban Missile Crisis; what many believe (and many historians still see it) this was the freezing point of the Cold War, when At that moment, the world's precarious balance of power nearly collapsed in a sudden global catastrophe and destruction. To say this was a bloody day in Cuban life would be almost an understatement. Cuban society oscillates between national pride and a newfound self-confidence on one side and existential fear and fatal apprehension on the other.
Amid this turmoil, we follow the lackluster experience of Sergio Carmona Mendoyo (Sergio Corrieri); a 38-year-old middle-class half-intellectual and aspiring writer , inherited the family's furniture business, and lived by collecting rent from the family's various properties, including the apartment he lived in on the top floor. The narrative of the film is simple. Sergio accompanied his parents and estranged wife, who were fleeing Cuba to Miami, to the airport. He stayed in Cuba, not really working, not really writing, just wandering around aimlessly. He immersed himself in his recollections of various arguments with his wife (especially one he recorded without his wife's knowledge, which seemed to particularly bother him--perhaps because it was so precise involving inappropriate records of personal experiences and turmoil), he peeps through his binoculars on his neighbors, assists his friend Pablo to leave Cuba, and fantasizes about his housekeeper (whose baptism, in his imagination, becomes a sensual moments full of erotic pleasure, while he himself plays the role of the priest), listlessly attends literary seminars, and has a relationship with a man named Elena (Daisy Granados). The young aspiring actress has an affair. He took her back to his apartment, let her try on and took his wife's clothes, and had sex with her. Soon, her immaturity and lack of curiosity in the pursuit of knowledge bored him, and he dumped her. Before long, her family came and Elena told him she was only 16 and that he had taken her virginity, and she sued him. The focus of Underdeveloped Memories is clearly not plot; the film is a collection of footage: some are documentary in nature (mostly from earlier films and footage), some are common to fictional films style (actors are on set, acting according to the script), some are clips from other films (one in particular is a compilation of clips that have been judged too obscene by previous Cuban censors), and some are directly followed The protagonist walks with passers-by on the streets of Havana (there is such a striking moment near the end of the film: Sergio's taxi is stopped by a policeman who looks directly at the camera, apparently at the Curious about the reason for the shoot - then Sergio goes backwards through a crowd of Afro-Cubans). In this way, the film becomes a study of cinematic technology, intended to provoke reflections on the impact of the revolution on those who steadfastly refuse to take any stand. To be sure, Sergio is a model of existential dissatisfaction (with resentment as a mode of dealing with oneself). He never hides his contempt for Cuba. The term "underdeveloped" is his catchphrase, recurring in his voice-over narration and in his conversations with other characters. Even so, he did nothing to leave Havana, but resolutely stayed in his intermittent and apparently temporary position. In a society that prides itself on eliminating capitalist injustice, he is still a capitalist; in a country that celebrates the proletariat, he is a bourgeois; in a system of pragmatism and political effectiveness, he is an aestheticist He is political agnostic in an age of loyalty and dedication. He's not a political prisoner; he's not one of the many middle-class elements that the Castro government has publicly punished (at least not in the time frame in the film - there are signs in the film that his property will soon be confiscated) . Neither an exile nor a revolutionary, Sergio realized that he was either too early or too late in his life. This is what he wanders about, and it is also the interstitial space that pursues him. He matured too late to fully enjoy the fruits of hope that had sprouted with the decline of the Batista era, but prematurely inherited the complacency and superiority of his class
So he walks around Havana like a ghost from the moment before; detached from his surroundings, but with nowhere to go either. Seemingly just out of habit, he continued to live a life he had alienated from himself, a resident alienated from his own country, a traveler too familiar with his surroundings to experience fleeting moments. surprise. Few of the characters in the film lead such a sloppy life without being associated with physical pain. All his material needs are met and still miserable - but worse than that, he exists in a kind of "non-existence", a tedious cookie-cutter, unabated, unrelenting , with no indication. All he had was rumination, intellectual pursuits, and sexual demands. One of the most typical features of the film is Sergio's various monologues on the political situation and current state of affairs in Cuba. Often, these monologues appear in documentary footage that is superimposed directly into the film. There is a lengthy section discussing the counter-revolutionaries who were arrested, tried and executed as a sign of the failure of the Bay of Pigs. According to Sergio, these figures represent the social roles and hierarchies of labor specific to capitalism: entrepreneurs, priests, philosophers, torturers, public officials, and politicians. Each of them has their own function, but only the whole they form, the inner discipline that binds them together, and the vision of the future that determines their actions give them meaning. However, Sergio asserts to us that, on trial, these individuals failed to see how their individual responsibilities were intertwined with group responsibilities, and how their aspirations were intertwined with and permeated by collective aspirations. We heard from them in interviews on file, who denied personal responsibility for the crimes they were accused of. Sergio argued that these counter-revolutionaries lacked sufficient dialectical understanding of the relationship between individuals and groups and failed to realize that the functionality of a group can only be determined by the diversifying and complicating effects of individual choice and individual behavior. Realization; a person can be individualized only through his participation in the group. Sergio knew what to say; he understood the analytic framework suited to revolutionary regimes, but this understanding did not seem to prompt him to adopt any critical attitude towards his life, his way of being. If not for the refusal to recognize the dialectical relationship between him and his environment, his own role in what he condemns as underdevelopment, and his own alienation due to his unwillingness to devote himself to any social life around him ——If not for the above, where does his guilt come from? Gutierrez Allai keeps complaining For documentary footage (sometimes accompanied by Sergio's comments, sometimes not - for example, we see this interesting scene: on the other side of the fence away from the Guantanamo Bay restricted area, an American soldier Throwing stones at Cuban cameras). The film thus becomes fragmented, unable to gain the sense of security brought about by a continuous thread of continuity, refusing to provide the audience with the stability of a single channel of communication. The meaning of this film emerges in the gaps—technical and existential gaps. As Sergio said while joking with Elena, the film is full of "the same actions, the same words, the same actions, the same words," repeated endlessly. The meaning expressed in the form of a single signifier is disturbed by the musical meaning of the rhythmic repetition, and the specificity of the figure sinks into the seductive quagmire of endlessly repeated details.
Sergio's intellectual pursuits did not delight him, but he did not give up either. He looks down on those who have poor cultural attainments and poor aesthetic perception, but he is not very concerned about the promotion and utilization of his own cultural knowledge and aesthetic interests. When he was participating in a (unsurprisingly) seminar called "Literature and Underdevelopment," he was rather bored. Discussions by panelists at the conference touched on the "underdeveloped" state of Latin literature, and whether this is a situation that needs to be addressed at the level of America's relationship with Latin America, or the contradictions of late capitalism itself. A scholar made a Nietzschean-like argument, arguing that the term “underdevelopment” itself is an example of identification with disadvantaged situations, focusing on comparisons with relative prosperity rather than differences. Meanwhile, Sergio scolded Edmundo Desnos, who was lighting a cigar while listening to the conversation of his colleagues. Desnoes, author of the original novel and screenplay). Sergio asserts that Desnos feels so superior to himself only because he is in this underdeveloped context, and only because Cuba is relatively irrelevant. Anywhere else, he would be nothing but a nobody. The next scene is one of the most dramatic in the film, and the climax of the film as it approaches the last third. Sergio walks across a wide boulevard toward the camera, thinking about the seminar he'd just attended. He seems to have drawn all the wrong conclusions from it. He still clings to the concept of "underdevelopment," which he now finds increasingly difficult to shake off. "In underdevelopment, there is no continuity," he said thoughtfully. "Everything is forgotten. People are capricious. But you still remember a lot. You remember too much." As he pondered these questions, the camera zoomed in on his face, gradually falling out of focus. In a short while, his face became an abstract field of light and shadow, the details were indistinguishable, obscuring all identification. "You are nothing. You are dead," he read, "and the final destruction begins." At this point, the whole picture is only a vague gray, a "non-image", a twilight nothingness . We witness Sergio's de-subjectification and subsequent de-objectification. He laments that he has nowhere to stand, but blames his situation on the political, cultural and economic "underdevelopment" around him, rather than his own choices. Thus we begin to see that, for Sergio, the relative lack of the signifier of "underdeveloped" is not the poverty of money or knowledge. "Underdevelopment" to him is the reduction or closure of privileged channels. The lack of consistency cannot be attributed to the academics he auditioned, or even to the political environment in which he finds himself. His young love, Elena, was immature and childish, but she always was. The lack of consistency he lamented was due to the fact that life no longer delivered the benefits to him as he was accustomed to. Not everything was forgotten; he just felt that he and his prerogatives were being ignored and ignored. As the faded image shows, Sergio dissipates in the fog of the gap, neither here nor there, neither oppressor nor oppressed. All he had left were his memories, and the memories did not allow him to breathe. Not everything was forgotten; he just felt that he and his prerogatives were being ignored and ignored. As the faded image shows, Sergio dissipates in the fog of the gap, neither here nor there, neither oppressor nor oppressed. All he had left were his memories, and the memories did not allow him to breathe. Not everything was forgotten; he just felt that he and his prerogatives were being ignored and ignored. As the faded image shows, Sergio dissipates in the fog of the gap, neither here nor there, neither oppressor nor oppressed. All he had left were his memories, and the memories did not allow him to breathe.
Not surprisingly, Sergio finds respite in his pursuit of erotic pleasure. It's well-documented that a wind loss test goes hand in hand with a midlife crisis. The hormonal craving for sexual release has subsided, but this only fuels one's imagination of the connection between masculinity and meaning in life. Capability implies possibility (at least in human fantasy), so one would worry that a decline in sexual ability and desire (of course, not necessarily relatedly) marks a person's advance into the future (potential possibility) The end of power: "You are nothing. You are dead." Moreover, when political effectiveness is out of reach, people often seek some way of conquest, and for a man who fears he will lose power in the social world Few things are more immediate and immediate to man than sexual acquisition. So his fantasy life is so extravagant, he imagines the baptism of the housekeeper as a vampire-like spring dream, when she is poured into his arms, her thin burqa soaked with water and becomes transparent; religious sacraments become become a depraved illusion of sexual conquest. The way he seduces Elena is equally pathetic. He used his relationship at the Cuban Film Institute with director Gutierrez Allai to tease her (plus the presence of Desnos, another way the film indulges in self-referentiality); and He gave her the wardrobe that his wife had abandoned. He may not know how young she is, but he can realize that he is taking advantage of a simple-minded person. His indulgences brought him no real solace. Even his fantasy life and sexual relationships (including between him and his wife) are "underdeveloped". They have nowhere to go, they are stagnant, powerless for any development, for anything to happen. Despite Sergio's grievances against his country, he himself could not construct anything, could not leave any positive imprint on the earth, any stele sign (however small, however insignificant to the whole world), could not Leaving any sign that he ever existed. Sergio exists like nothingness, and nothingness leaves no trace. Nor is his remaining sexual capacity enough to substitute for his utter inability to carry out any plans; if, like Martin Heidegger, According to Heidegger, human beings are creatures that project themselves into the future, and that humans exist in the present to erect something meaningful tomorrow, then Sergio completely disqualifies himself as a qualified being. Yet, while we may find ourselves somewhat contemptuous of Sergio, we still identify with him to some degree. Few of us—at least some of the time—are immune to the quest for memory that threatens to displace our sense of existence in a world where we don’t yet have a place. In those darkest moments of unabashed, utter candor, how many of us can honestly say we don’t live up to our potential. When our power wanes, we all feel like we've succumbed to "underdevelopment" in some way. We could and should have been better. Our selfish side cries: the world should have given us more, the success of the world is accumulated for those who have been successful in the past, and the underdevelopment is accumulated for those who are ignored (so with a little bit of Taste of Malcolm Gladwell [college note: Malcolm Gladwell, Anglo-Canadian nonfiction author and bestselling author]). The reason Sergio feels like he's being exploited is that those who previously had nothing are now in a dominant position (at least in his view), which leaves his privilege nowhere to stand. There are moments when we all wander in the gaps of our own lives, between our own successes and our failures, when the distinction between the two seems to cease to be significant, where we are like nothing, where Our existence is completely annihilated. "This is where the final destruction begins." the taste of). The reason Sergio feels like he's being exploited is that those who previously had nothing are now in a dominant position (at least in his view), which leaves his privilege nowhere to stand. There are moments when we all wander in the gaps of our own lives, between our own successes and our failures, when the distinction between the two seems to cease to be significant, where we are like nothing, where Our existence is completely annihilated. "This is where the final destruction begins."
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