Tomás Gutiérrez Alea was born in Havana, in 1928. He studied to become a lawyer at the University of Havana, but never practiced law. Instead, he left for Rome as soon as he graduated, to be trained as a movie director. In 1955, he and Julio García Espinosa co-directed El Mégano, whose scriptwrirers were Alfredo Guevara and José Massip.

This harsh, beautiful documentary about the cruel life led by coal-makers at the Zapata Swamp was sequestered by the henchmen of the tyrant Batista, and its producers' ñames were fíled by the pólice.

In 1959, just after the triumph of the Revolution, the young artist immediately became in- volved in the countrys cultural epic. On that same year 1959, he directed the documentary Esta tierra nuestra, (This Land of Ours) and on the following year, he directed his fírst fea- ture film Historias de la Revolución (Stories ofthe Revolution).

In 1966, with La muerte de un burócrata (Death of a Bureaucrat), he evinced the excep- tional traits that led him to an impeccable film- making, where the traces of Italian neorealism persist, together with a peculiar synthesis of black humor and surrealism.

Thus, in a spiral of artistic maturity that rose with every new, Titón directed in 1 986 Memorias del subdesarrollo (Memories of Underdevelopment), his masterpiece, and un- questionably one of the major Cuban and Latin American films of these times. No one doubts the fact that this realist, harsh and straight forward film is a must for whoever wants to know Cuba in the 60s.

Titón with his wife, the actress Mirta Ibarra

In 1971, Titón undertook the colossal task of producing an artistically ambitious film, based on a story inspired by Don Fernando Ortizs writings: Una pelea cubana contra los demonios (A Cuban Fight Against the Demons). The result was perhaps Titóns most out- standing failure, something he always admitted.

In 1983, he made a successful comeback with Hasta cierto punto (To a certain point), a film set in the port of Havana, that dealt with longshoremen there.

Ten years later, terminally ill and being already 63 years old, this tireless creator made one of his best films: Fresa y chocolate (Strawberry and Chocolate), that deals with a forbidden topic, critically reviews Cuban society at present, and draws audiences in Cuba and abroad. The Gutiérrez Alea we used to know realistic, straight forward, honest, irreverent and at times vitriolic had reappeared.

If there is something we should briefly mention, It is that he was profoundly Cuban in his quest for truth, his tenacity, his ethics and his occasionally caustic sense of humor. His recent de mise left a heritage of films which new generations of movie-goers, critics and film-makers will enjoy and analyze as testimonies of their own times.

Courtesy of Habanera Magazine