OCEANS ARE THE REAL CONTINENTS: Sing a Song of Exile

The specter of departure haunts every frame of Oceans Are the Real Continents, director Tommaso Santambrogio’s lyrical drama set in the Cuban town of San Antonio De Los Baños. Shot in a velvety black and white so rich that you can almost feel the texture of each shot through the screen, the film follows three sets of characters as they contemplate how the dark shadow of exile colors the past, present, and future of themselves and their country.

Coming and Going…and Going

In one of the most visually striking opening sequences in recent memory, thirtysomething couple Edith (Edith Ybarra Clara) and Alex (Alexander Diego) enact an avant-garde theatrical piece amidst the pouring rain, with Alex hanging from a cross in a tangle of vines as Edith stands before him, only for him to eventually drift out of the frame and away from her. It’s a dreamlike premonition of what is to come, though Edith is the one who will be drifting away; a talented puppeteer, she is waiting for her visa to be approved so that she can leave Cuba and tour Europe with her art. When Edith suggests Alex stage the theatrical piece in Amazonia, he brushes her suggestion aside; the piece was written for San Antonio De Los Baños, and that is where it—and he—will remain.

source: Film Movement

Edith’s impending departure casts a pall over the otherwise passionate relationship between her and Alex. Yet they are not the only people in San Antonio De Los Baños filled with this strange mix of hope and despair. Nine-year-old Frank (Frank Ernesto Lam) spends his days goofing off with his best friend Alain (Alain Alain Alfonso González) and discussing their shared dream of leaving Cuba to play baseball for the New York Yankees. But when Frank overhears his mother planning a family move to Miami, he realizes he’s not yet ready to leave behind everything he knows and loves. Meanwhile, elderly street vendor Milagros (Milagros Llanes Martínez) lives a quiet, lonely life with only her radio and her old letters for company; the letters are all she has left of her husband, who died fighting a war in Angola many years ago.

Caribbean Elegy

Oceans Are the Real Continents glides smoothly back and forth between these three sets of characters, all mourning relationships inevitably torn asunder by emigration and exile. Even when leaving Cuba is viewed as something to be anticipated with excitement, that excitement is tempered by the realization that nothing will ever be the same afterward—for better and for worse. It’s a country that some see as lacking opportunities for the young and thus remains in the throes of a migration crisis, yet it is also rich in other ways that cannot be underestimated.

source: Film Movement

In creating this, his first feature film, Santambrogio spent years observing and interacting with Cuban people and listening to them tell their own stories of separation. Five of the people he spoke with became the protagonists of Oceans Are the Real Continents, first-time actors who infuse their characters with themselves and the film’s narrative with their own experiences. The result is a film that feels natural and authentic, almost to the point of documentary, and easily transports the viewer. It contains long stretches without dialogue in which seemingly the only sound is the ever-present rain, pounding the island and adding to the atmosphere of languid sadness that pervades the entire film; the pace is slow, as though all of the characters are weighed down by the water. The black and white cinematography by Lorenzo Casadio Vannucci is breathtaking and, combined with Santambrogio’s humanistic storytelling, will likely earn Oceans Are the Real Continents comparisons to Alfonso Cuarón’s similarly stunning Roma.

Conclusion:

Oceans Are the Real Continents is a beautiful, bittersweet love letter to a place and a people that remain irrevocably intertwined even in separation.

Oceans Are the Real Continents opens at Film Forum in New York on January 10, 2025, with additional markets to follow.