Viva

Jesus is a hairdresser in Cuba's capital and he works with the performers of a drag venue run by Mama – an effervescent and passionate man who can hold an audience – but needs the right wig. Jesus also does his wigs but longs to don the dresses, make up wigs and sparkle on stage like the drag acts he sees perform.

Then one day his estranged father turns up. He is an ex boxer with a dark past, a smoking and drinking habit and attitudes that make him anything but receptive to his sons wishes – sparks are gonna fly.

Now this is from Irish director Paddy Breathnatch ('Shrooms') and was co funded by The Irish Film Board – written by Mark O'Halloran, who also has a small part here and brought us 'Garage' as well as appearing in a number of films including 'The Guard'. As such the collaboration or Irish and Cuban talent works very well.

One of the biggest criticisms has been the failure to put sub titles to the songs that are performed in the film. It is in Spanish so naturally is sub titled, but the songs are not. Paddy Breathnatch has said this was to ensure the audience concentrated on the performances and not just try to read the words etc. Well I could have managed both and I am sure a few others could too. That said I really enjoyed this film, it is a great script, a strong cast and enough drama to keep a drama queen happy. Plus you get some fabulous performances on stage too, so it is a film I can recommend.

Run-down Havana pretends to be a bustling city through the raucousness of its inhabitants and the creaking of its decades-old cars. Ubiquitous poverty is barely concealed by flashy cheap clothing and rum. Loneliness is under every character's skin, who grasp at any chance to escape in a tedious struggle for their lives. In this inaspicious setting, Jesús is a hairdresser who does an old lady's hair, he brushes wigs for drag queens performing in a cabaret attended by bolero lovers. Dullness and uneventfullness is one day broken into by his father, who'd left the home when Jesús was only three. Father is not pleased with his son's tastes, job, friends and lifestyle. Just as Jesús feels his life escapes his control to a stranger father, life will give them both an opportunity they hadn't asked for.

In the 1970s, when I lived in Old San Juan (Puerto Rico), there was a black, round transvestite known as Lorena, who performed at the club "Cabaret," where he was a sensation for a couple of months with his hyper-dramatic interpretations of songs like Roberta Flack's "First Time Ever I Saw Your Face". He knelt on the stage, prayed, pleaded, even wept a bit, never losing his sense of humor, nor hiding the effect of detachment which, in general, good transvestite shows produce. Then, about three decades later, living in La Habana, I realized that the local homosexual subculture survived in a bubble, with patterns of social behavior (ranging from partying to couple interaction) that referred me to times gone by, as a recycling of the 1950s at the close of the 20th century. These manifestations, as well as the bitchiness in relations, have, of course, not died on or off the island, and they persist along with the "urbanity" of the "gay" community (more selective and classist), but I found they were almost the rule in Cuba. These two memories combined in my head, when the Irish film "Viva" ended and Héctor Medina as Jesus, the hairdresser who chooses to be a transvestite, became a kind of La Lupe, crying, imploring, pulling curtains from the cabaret managed by Mama (Luis Alberto García), in a highly current story, if we only consider the homophobia that reigns in almost all contemporary societies and that is at the center of the movie. At the same time, in the script by Mark O'Halloran, the same man who wrote the remarkable "Garage" (2007), I perceived a certain "poofy fascination" with an old and decadent universe that cries out for renewal. If O'Halloran achieved a well-measured drama in the Irish countryside in "Garage," I think that in other people's territory he emphasized the exotic and lost in realism. Despite the attempt to truthfully show misery and the alternatives of a young man who, in the absence of the stage of a transvestite club, opts for prostitution, "Viva" is a syrupy portrait of the streets of Cuba (that "inner Havana," opposed to the better-off life of the privileged people of the island) and its dens (as opposed to the big, fancy cabarets with larger budgets). One can overlook the filmmakers' ecstasy with the old- fashioned spectacles of transvestites (by interpreters-actors who have always lived a marginal existence and suffered severe exploitation), but where "Viva" loses more effectiveness is in its melodramatic approach to the relationship between Jesus and his father (Jorge Perugorría), who suddenly breaks into the boy's life and opposes his purpose. There is enough material to incite tears and emotion, as in the best melodramas, with music that exaggerates the pain we already perceive in the good performances by Medina, Perugorría, García, Laura Alemán and Paula Alí. For that drama beyond moderation, "Viva" is enjoyed, but I suppose there must be followers of film aesthetics according to Bruce La Bruce, Larry Clark, Gaspar Noé and Gustavo Vinagre, who would have been grateful for something a bit more graphic in the approach to eroticism and violence that permeate "Viva".

The first thing that knocks you out is the cinematography. It is a marvel how they can pull that off in a run-down, old, desolate place like Old Havana. But besides the obvious drag-queen story there is a very realistic depiction of life in Havana which, although touched up a bit, still gives the viewer a sense of how it really is. Well-known Cuban actors Luis Alberto Garcia (unrecognizable in drag) and Jorge Perugorría give excellent performances, but the star is newcomer Hector Medina. The only low point of the movie is the subtitle translation which does not do justice to the writing. I'm not sure how this film will play in Peoria, but in Miami's Little Havana where I saw it today it did just fine.

Viva (2015) is an Irish film, set in Cuba, directed by Paddy Breathnach.

The film stars Héctor Medina as Jesus, a young gay man who is a professional hairdresser. He also works fixing the wigs of drag queens who perform at a local night club. Eventually, he performs in drag, and he turns out to be highly talented.

Jesus's mother is dead. His father killed a man, and has been in prison for 20 years. The plot begins when his father returns. Angel, played Jorge Perugorría, starts out as a unidimensional macho brute. However, director Breathnach is too talented to let him remain nothing more than a stereotype. An interesting relationship begins between father and son, and that's the real strength of the movie.

Well, that's one of the real strengths of the movie. The other strength is the music and the drag performances. These men are talented, and we don't just see little clips of their acts--the camera lingers on them, and their work draws you in.

We saw this movie in a special preview performance at the excellent Little Theatre in Rochester, NY. The ImageOut LGBT Film Festival is one of the highlights of the year in Rochester, and ImageOut sponsored this special showing.

The director of ImageOut film selection, Michael Gamilla, told us that he saw this movie at a festival in Berlin, and begged the producer to let it be shown in Rochester. (It will be shown in the U.S., but only in limited release in larger cities.) Because the movie hasn't been released yet, a print was available, and Rochester got it. Good work by Michael; good luck for us.

This is a movie that will really work better on the large screen, because the drag performances will be diminished--literally and figuratively--on the small screen. If you live in New York, Chicago, Miami, or San Francisco, you may get a chance to see it in a theater. If not, try to get it on the small screen. You'll still enjoy it.