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8 of 9 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Political-historical documentary making at its best, December 11, 2008
This review is from: Cuba: An African Odyssey (DVD)
Cuba: An African Odyssey is a brilliantly-executed documentary on Cuban involvement in Africa from the 1960s to the 1980s. It's a two-dvd package, the first dealing mainly with Congo in the early 60s, the second with Cuba's intervention in Angola in the 70s and 80s. The director Jihan El-Tahri includes interviews with many of the power-players involved, from Fidel Castro to Pik Botha. It includes fabulous archive footage, in particular of Congo at the time of Lumumba's assassination. Then CIA station chief Larry Devlin puts his version on the record. It documents Che Guevara's intervention in the Eastern Congo, which, strangely, is sometimes hilarious. The Cubans age well. Some of them look like they could do it all again, almost fifty years later. It's the best high-profile documentary I've seen, and that's unqualified. It gives the viewer a crash-course in the sequence of cynicism that resulted in the manmade tragedy of Sub-Saharan Africa today. Watching old men trying to make their peace before they meet their maker can be far more revealing than the subject of the interview realises. Absolutely excellent, I'm buying it for Christmas for all my friends.
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4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
An impressive, surprisingly balanced, first-hand account of what really happened in Angola, March 29, 2010
This review is from: Cuba: An African Odyssey (DVD)
This is an impressive and surprisingly balanced first-hand account of what really happened in Angola. The production team interviewed South Africans, Cubans, and Angolans to compile a visceral account of how Angola came to be a cold-war battleground between the US, the Soviet Union, Cuba, and South Africa. The film starts with a stunning and revealing question: Why did Nelsen Mandela choose to visit Cuba and embrace Fidel Castro for his first international trip? The rest of the film answers this question by covering Cuba's involvement in Congo and Angola. In the end, the Cubans swung the deal by agreeing to leave Angola if the South Africans would leave Namibia and release Mandela. The film also covers the reasoning behind the US funding for UNITA and Cuba's extensive support to the eventual victors (MPLA). It is also a disturbing tale of how US paranoia helped produce an African arms race that need never have taken place, all in an effort to contain a Soviet threat that never existed.
Perhaps the most interesting characters are Castro and his lieutenants. It's easy to lose site of Cuba's totalitarian, oppressive regime in all the full-throated, enthusiasm to bring freedom to Africa. One highly interesting point is a portion of the film that describes the advice of Russian advisors who insisted the MPLA aggressively assault enemy positions only to be pasted time and time again. It was only after Castro himself began directing the war effort (over the phone!) that MPLA/Cuban combined forces were able to crush UNITA forces. There is also an entertaining aside about Jorge Bisquet (and a personal interview with him) about his constant cigar smoking during the negotiations. The production team did not ignore the American side and included remarkably frank interviews of Crocker. Perhaps the most disturbing portion of the film is Larry Devlin's personal account (CIA Congo station chief at the time) of recieving poison toothpaste from the US with which to murder Congo's first President, Lumumba (which he chose not to use).
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2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Casto, the Left, and the Developing world, August 20, 2009
This review is from: Cuba: An African Odyssey (DVD)
This documentary is instrumental in understanding some of the unknown influences Castro, Guevara and the Cuban Revolution had on the world especially on the Nationalists and Leftists in the developing world.
It also illustrates the nature of the Soviet-Cuban relationship and how Castro utilized the massive amounts of Soviet military and logistical aid he received during the Cold War.
Whether you respect or despise Castro there is no doubt that he has made an indelible mark on history.
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