OPIS
As an AmeriCuban who remembers her visits to Cuba as a small child, I was very touched to see on screen the Cuba that I knew was not just in my dreams.
What an excellent job in picking places that can make you really think it was filmed in Havana! You can feel as if you are really there! There are those who wonder how Andy Garcia could have portrayed Cuba so realistically when he left the island as a 5 year old child. But it is at those very young tender years that impressions are made that stay throughout ones lives. My early trips to Cuba have remained very vivid in my mind. I understand him so well.
You can feel that he put his all in this movie. Countless Cubans can relate to the story that is told. What a heart-wrenching moment when he leaves Cuba and his only keepsake is taken away from him! How many Cubans must have passed through this same scene?
The music warmed my soul. I would listen to it over and over.