91
Metascore
20 reviews · Provided by Metacritic.com
- 100The GuardianPeter BradshawThe GuardianPeter BradshawIt is strident, yes, and naive, too perhaps; but lyrical and passionate and visually dazzling.
- 100San Francisco ChronicleG. Allen JohnsonSan Francisco ChronicleG. Allen JohnsonPowered by the great Soviet director Mikhail Kalatozov ("The Cranes Are Flying") and the unmatched handheld black-and-white cinematography of Sergei Urusevsky, it is one of the most visually hypnotic films ever -- and that's not hyperbole.
- 100The A.V. ClubScott TobiasThe A.V. ClubScott TobiasI Am Cuba is still propaganda of the first order, a beautiful and sensually overwhelming tribute to the land and its people.
- 100San Francisco ChronicleEdward GuthmannSan Francisco ChronicleEdward GuthmannPhotographed in lush black and white by Sergei Urusevsky, who worked with the amazingly inventive camera operator Alexander Calzatti, "I Am Cuba" unfolds like a cinematic Olympics of complex, acrobatic camera moves.
- 100Slant MagazineEd GonzalezSlant MagazineEd GonzalezI Am Cuba is a cinephile’s wet dream, a collage of Herculean feats of technical wizardry that would be easy to dismiss if it wasn’t so humane.
- 89Austin ChronicleMarc SavlovAustin ChronicleMarc SavlovAudacious, thrilling, erotic (and in three languages, no less), I Am Cuba is a lost masterpiece of filmmaking finally seeing the light of day 30 years after its production.
- 80The Observer (UK)The Observer (UK)The result is a technically astonishing mixture of optimistic Stalinist kitsch, agitprop and the epic Soviet style of the Twenties.
- 75Chicago Sun-TimesRoger EbertChicago Sun-TimesRoger EbertEven its depravities and imperialist Yankee misbehavior seem quaint. But as an example of lyrical black and white filmmaking, it is still stunning.
- 75San Francisco ExaminerSan Francisco ExaminerWith all that has happened to the Soviet Union, and to the dreams of the Cuban revolution, in the years since "I Am Cuba" was made, the film can't help feeling like a relic of a discarded era. But it still has power to surprise and, occasionally, to enchant.