Comandante

It warms my heart to discover that there are human beings in charge on some parts of the planet. Stone's documentary, although annoyingly pop videoish in places shows us the human side of Castro. I do not care where your politics lie, who can argue with a policy of housing, education and health care for all. Castro is portrayed by the US in an uncomplimentary light, well its good to know not all Americans feel that he is a ruthless dictator.

I want to know what Bush would say about crime, prostitution, religion, war and torture. He would not only deny it he would outright claim his country to be perfect. well nobody or country is perfect, and a least Castro can admit this. I just think of all he has achieved with one hand tied behind his back, it put's the West to shame, if his democracy is different to our's, who are we to say he is wrong!

Despite the anti-Castro rhetoric that has been going on in this country since the 1960's, this film has managed to make its way to the mainstream media of the most hostile nation towards Cuba. This documentary gives us a view at Cuba's Fidel Castro. Castro has been one of the most talked about leaders this century and has managed to "control" or stay in power more than any other head of state alive today. Demonized and admired by millions worldwide, Castro is seen as he is today, an aged man with stories and anecdotes that would require volumes to ever capture on film. I highly suggest viewing this film, regardless of you political persuasion. For those who view Castro as a revolutionary , the always active and still brilliant way that he answers some of Stone's toughest questions, this film will probably further your admiration in this charismatic figure. For those who view him as a ruthless dictator, you might see this film as a bit soft. Stone does not insult him or complicate him, at least not to a level that Castro can not handle. Maybe it is the fact that this documentary shows a human being and not our common image of a communist on the quest for power.

Oliver Stone, probably one of the most relevant filmmakers of the last decades in the United States, has been trying to get the American public –one of the most ignorant and alienated populations among developed countries– into alternative sides of what in the USA has been called the "official story". Comandante is not an exception in that aim, and it may approach the viewers to some topics that big media corporations and the military-industrial complex have been boycotting through the years in order to avoid the public to ask their government about some big questions. Stone's filmography evidences his own interest in the last half of the recent century –the half he was born in and the events, after WW2, that bring the United States to become what we know today–, and the plots that –in his own words– diminished individual freedom and democratic values in "the land of the free and the home of the brave!" Position for which he has often been criticized "for promoting conspiracy theories and alleged historical inaccuracies." This documentary is an important effort, now that Fidel Castro –one of the 10 most influential politicians of the last century– is probably close to the end of his life. Some analysts have said that the 20th Century will have officially ended after Castro's death.

This film is a fantastic, hypnotic encounter with the legendary Marxist, world agitator and bete noire to America, Fidel Castro. It features left-wing warrior Oliver Stone's trademark flash cutting and controversial storytelling, alongside a simply stunning musical score from Alberto Iglesias. Prepare for the Buena Vista Social Club (2001) on revolutionary acid.

The beginning of Commandante – yet another Oliver Stone masterpiece – is similar to the beginning of his epic JFK (1991): lots of archive footage of Castro and Cuba, only this time intercut with masses of frenzied crowds drunk on revolutionary fervour, all shouting 'Fidel, Fidel', hailing their great man who is still there in this film, forty years later. Incredible.

There is both 1960s and modern footage of Havana featuring giant murals of 'Che' Guevara, Fidel ('VIVA FIDEL CASTRO') and … a total absence of any corporate, Western advertising whatsoever. There is a lot of poverty, but also a series of impromptu meetings between Castro (and Stone) and various Cubans in the streets. Propaganda or planned? The movie harks back to the original revolution in 1959 and Castro's initial pro-Western peoples revolution, hailing (in English) 'representative democracy' and 'social justice'. Of course, the American corporations and political elite could never countenance any notion of true democracy just ninety miles from their corrupt lands and so the story unfolds of how various presidents tried to invade the island and destroy their path.

Fidel himself at 80 is surprisingly fit and optimistic, always in his olive green military fatigues. He appears to be a genuine messiah, despite the paradox of religion and atheistic communism in this island paradise. He wears his customary beard, is polite and genuinely sincere. Castro and Oliver Stone – in a remarkably frank and candid series of interviews – go on to discuss everything from politics, film, women and nationalism. Castro admires Sophia Loren, Charlie Chaplin, Khruschev, Gorbachev, Depardieu and a host of others. He has watched Titanic and Gladiator but hates Nixon – who he considers the originator of the American hatred of his island – yet feels sorry for Kennedy for being assassinated.

Could George W Bush even consider for one second walking the streets of his capital city? No, he would be strung up as a corrupt war criminal and stooge to all of the corporate giants that have been banished from Cuba (Texaco, Gulfoil, McDonalds, etc.).

In the original 1960s footage Castro is hailed by crowds of literally one million people. He is a strange combo of Dr Caligari, Karl Marx and the Pope.

This film is an interesting document only because it provides a glimpse into the leader's more trivial pursuits. ("I've seen TITANIC on video. It needs a big screen" says Castro.) It fails miserably where Oliver Stones asks tough questions yet fails to pursue the partial answers, or at times total avoidance of the question altogether.

Some of the issues talked around are surprising (The CIA role in Angola, Cuba's AIDS quarantine camps, the role of Miami exiles, 1980's prison camps for gays) while others are just bizarre (the lack of multiple parties in Cuban elections, his son's US education, Nicaragua and Venezuela).

The documentary instead puts us through yet another series of Che Guevara tales told less than honestly by Fidel. The frequent shots of Eva Peron suggest that Fidel Castro's revolution is not a failed relic but rather the dreamy illusions of yet another misguided albeit glamorous femme fatale.