Landmark News Program Continues to Draw Interest

"Los Comandantes de la Revolucion" are seen in a photograph from 1959, the year their troops ousted the government of Fulgencio Batista and installed Fidel Castro as Cuba's leader., a photo by Pan-African News Wire File Photos on Flickr.

Havana. January 24, 2013

Landmark news program continues
to draw interest

Mireya Castañeda

Cuba’s Noticiero ICAIC Latinoamericano, the Cuban Film Institute’s Latin American news program, which some 53 years ago “left its mark on the world of documentaries, and the world of news, not only in Cuba,” was founded by Alfredo Guevara and directed by Santiago Álvarez. It continues to draw great interest.

Given the unmistakable style of Santiago Álvarez and the broad variety of national and international issues addressed, the news program’s 1,493 shows, plus three extra editions (1960-1991) were included, in 2009, as part of UNESCO’s World Memory Register.

The first welcome news to follow this honor was the signing of an agreement between ICAIC and France’s National Audiovisual Institute (INA) to begin the restoration of the valuable copies existent.

The first lot of 250 programs was sent to France and during the 35th International Festival of New Latin American Cinema, in December 2013, the digitalized versions of 54 of these, filmed between 1960 and 1963, were presented in Havana by INA Director Mathieu Gallet.

This laudable effort to ensure that future generations know their own history, in the broadest sense of the word, has led to the presentation of an impressive book entitled El Noticiero ICAIC y sus voces (from the Pablo de la Torriente Brau Cultural Center’s La Memoria publishing house) by researcher and filmmaker Mayra Álvarez (Havana, 1951), a work which received the 2009 Memory Prize, awarded by the Center since 1996.

The book was presented during the recent film festival by cinematographer Manuel Herrera (No hay sábado sin sol, Capablanca, Bailando cha-cha-chá) who described it as an enormous catalogue, given the vast amount of information it includes, commenting that the content represents the equivalent of 60 full-feature length, two-hour films.

Víctor Casaus, author and Pablo Center director, wrote in the book’s prologue, “This book effectively incorporates the voices of the principal protagonists in this adventure of creation, the risk and the communication which was the Noticiero ICAIC Latinoamericano.”

This is in fact the case because the main body of the volume consists of interviews with founding participants and workers of the program which “left its mark on the world of documentaries, and the world of news, not only in Cuba,” as Alfredo Guevara stated in a quote from his book of essays Tiempo de fundación, cited in the prologue.

The book Noticiero ICAIC y sus voces gets its title from the documentary of the same name which the author released in 2010, widely screened during celebrations of the news show’s 50th anniversary.

The 350-page tome, after a prologue and brief introduction, opens with a chapter on early efforts, in which the author offers a brief summary of audiovisual news shows which have existed around the world and follows with a chapter on first steps in Cuba, from the 1920’s through 1959.

This second chapter addresses, for example, the thematic variety of images filmed over 30 years and the aesthetic elements which gave the news program its distinctive style, including its format and sound track.

Next the reader is treated to 39 interviews. The one with Alfredo Guevara was done in 2009, but the author could not include a conversation with Santiago Alvarez (1919-1998). She did use excerpts from interviews done by other more “fortunate” writers interested in the Noticiero ICAIC.

Mayra had the opportunity to converse with an important group of figures in Cuban cinema – filmmakers, producers, photographers, sound and light specialists, editors, musicians, narrators, writers, film archivists, equipment operators, animation artists and special effects people –
UNESCO ‘s Memory of film.

Its accessible, informative content, including the formidable collection of photographs, makes the book an invaluable reference for students, educators, researchers and all those seriously interested in film.

Mayra Álvarez, in a brief conversation with Granma International, announced that the book has a second part, saying, “I’ve already presented it as my doctoral thesis at the national advanced studies Art Institute (ISA)… A broader work about the Noticiero, from other points of view. It deals very much with the cinematographic language, as cultural heritage, as living memeory.”

As a documentary filmmaker, Mayra Alvarez released Los mundos de Massip in 2011, dedicated to the 2012 National Prize for Cinema winner, José Massip, which also led her to producing a book, one she’s been patiently awaiting, entitled El hombre de la piel de cine.

She is currently working on a third text about women in Cuban film, in different areas of work - directors, producers, casting, wardrobe specialists, screenplay writers, based on a survey she did across the country, going beyond ICAIC. She has been working, for three years, on a documentary about women directors which will be titled 17 evas.

As she points out in her introduction to El Noticiero ICAIC y sus voces, Mayra Alvarez is strongly attracted to the cinema, and although for a few years, life’s course took her in other directions, she finally returned “to what she truly feels, film.” Readers and movie-goers clearly owe this researcher-filmmaker their gratitude.