9 Best Movies from Cuba to Watch First

9 Essential Films from Cuba

Ranked native cinema in Cuba’s own creative voice.

1. 

   1. Memories of Underdevelopment

   Memorias del subdesarrollo · 1968

   After his wife and family flee to Miami in the wake of the Bay of Pigs, a bourgeois intellectual chooses to remain in revolutionary Havana, drifting through a transformed city and his own alienation as the missile crisis looms. A landmark of Cuban and world cinema.

2. 

   2. Behavior

   Conducta · 2014

   In a tough Havana neighborhood, a troubled eleven-year-old who trains fighting dogs and runs with petty criminals shares a deep bond with his devoted teacher — a bond threatened when illness and the school authorities intervene. A tender, socially minded drama.

3. 

   3. Juan of the Dead

   Juan de los muertos · 2011

   When the dead rise and overrun Havana and the state blames the chaos on US-backed dissidents, a lazy but resourceful slacker spots a business opportunity, launching a zombie-killing-for-hire service with his friends. A gleefully irreverent horror comedy.

4. 

   4. La muerte de un burócrata

   1966

   When a model revolutionary worker is buried with his labor card in his pocket, his widow cannot collect her pension without it — sending her nephew into an increasingly absurd, blackly comic battle with the graveyard and the bureaucracy to dig the card back up. A satirical farce.

5. 

   5. Portrait of Teresa

   Retrato de Teresa · 1979

   A Havana factory worker, mother of three, and dedicated union cultural organizer is stretched to her limit — and into open conflict with a husband who resents the time her ambitions take from home. A landmark Cuban drama about a woman's double burden.

6. 

   6. A Translator

   Un traductor · 2018

   Based on a true story, a Russian-literature professor in Havana is reassigned to translate for child victims of the Chernobyl disaster sent to Cuba for treatment, an assignment that quietly reshapes his priorities and his marriage. A tender drama.

7. 

   7. Habanastation

   2011

   When two Havana schoolboys from very different worlds — one privileged, one poor — end up thrown together in a struggling neighborhood, their unlikely friendship reveals the two faces of the city. A warm-hearted family film.

8. 

   8. The Beauty of the Alhambra

   La bella del Alhambra · 1989

   In 1920s Havana, an ambitious showgirl dreams of headlining the wildly popular Alhambra vaudeville theater, but her rise exacts a heavy price in love and ruin. A lush period melodrama of the Cuban stage.

9. 

   9. Lucía

   1968

   Three women named Lucía, in three different eras — the 1890s war of independence, the 1930s dictatorship, and the 1960s revolution — embody the changing place of women across Cuban history. Humberto Solás's sweeping, stylistically bold triptych.