2025 Latin American Film Festival: "Natural Phenomena"

Description

Join a film screening of Natural Phenomena (2024, 80 min.), directed by Cuban filmmaker Marcos Díaz Sosa. The film is in Spanish with English subtitles.

Díaz Sosa's wildly original tropical Cuban reinterpretation of Victor Fleming's The Wizard of Oz is nothing short of mind-blowing. While the iconic red shoes make an appearance, everything else is reimagined in unexpected and delightful ways.

In late-1980s Cuba, local nurse Vilma is a crack shot eager to enter the national skeet-shooting competition. The prize money would help her fulfill her dream of a bigger, more comfortable home where she could care for her injured husband and raise their soon-to-arrive child. Unfortunately for her, pregnant women are barred from competing, dashing her hopes—until a freak tornado whisks her over the rainbow to Niña Bonita, the isle hosting the tournament. Donning a blue dress and red slippers, Vilma sets out to prove her mettle in a strange land.

Natural Phenomenon captivates with its depiction of a strong, determined woman facing personal and social challenges as she seeks emancipation in a limiting context. A darkly comedic portrait of Cuban society, the film is a flourishing take on social cinema, a striking and moving narrative that addresses themes of freedom.

Exploring the rarely discussed topic of the exile of entire populations due to land exploitation, the film intertwines the protagonist's struggle with broader social transformations in Cuba.