| 19/03/2021 – 7:36 am (GMT-4)
The film critic of Granma, René Pérez Betancourt, has charged this Thursday from the organ of the Central Committee of the Communist Party against Planted, The film of the Cuban director in exile Lilo Villaplana, which addresses the story of the political prisoners of Castroism who, from the 60s, refused to wear the regulatory uniform and asked that they were recognized as political prisoners.
The premiere of the film at the Miami Film Festival, where he won the Audience Award, And also in Havana, where it could be seen in several headquarters of human rights activists, has achieved a repercussion that the pro-government press has not wanted to overlook.
In the note published by Granma, Pérez Betancourt qualifies Planted of “nyap” and states that he joins “the subversive campaign against Cuba, presenting a propagandistic and one-dimensional image of the subject they deal with, without making references to the causes – not a few of them criminal – that led those men to the prison”.
The critic also compares the film to a production by Andy García and Guillermo Cabrera Infante The lost city (Released in 2005), which he describes as “infamous”, and echoes Vilaplana’s criticism at the Miami Film Festival for not giving enough importance to the film.
“In 24 hours the film was placed on social media, something unusual for a premiere film, and expensive, which would have to continue presenting at festivals around the world to try to sell and raise funds,” he adds. Pérez Betancourt, ignoring the recent complaints from its director about this fact, which has affected it financially.
The pro-government critic also refers to “the open dream of filmmakers to think that they have billed a great work, able to respond – as they stated – to what he exposes The wasp network (Olivier Assayas, 2019), a film that outraged them for presenting true heroes opposed to the commandments of the empire. “
About the devastating film reviews he received The wasp network, Pérez Betancourt does not say a word.
the movie PlantedMeanwhile, it has provoked emotional reactions among Cubans on the island and in exile.
teens like Cuban activist Lázaro Mireles, Or the chess player Lázaro Bruzón have confessed to being impacted by the dramatic dimension of the facts that the film explains, the script was written by Ángel Santiesteban, Juan Manuel Cao and the director himself.
“I had already seen some documentaries on the subject, yet the film is another level. What value does these men have in facing so many injustices and violence against them. The biggest proof that everything narrated to happen like this is the real protagonists that many still live and come out in the end validating each argument “, Bruzón wrote in a Facebook post.
From the island, the scientist and activist Oscar Casanella also recently thanked Lilo Vilaplana, Àngel Santiesteban and all the people who took part in making this feature film.
“Especially thanks to this heroes who were political prisoners in those years when political repression was brutal and there was no internet or way to get information from Cuba. Thanks to those who never doubled, who by their example inspired many other Cubans to continue the fight for Cuba’s freedom, “Casanella stressed on social media.