_Strawberry and Chocolate_
reviewed by Cynthia Fuchs


     Directed by Tomas Guiterrez Alea, _Strawberry and Chocolate_ is a
warm, carefully drawn mix of political and personal choices, focused
through the experiences of an earnest college student named David
(Vladimir Cruz). As the film opens, David and his girlfriend Vivian are in
a dingy hotel room in Havana, 1979, where they have gone to have sex for
the first time. Moved by her tearful reluctance and anxious to please her,
he vows to prove his love for her by waiting until they are married. Cut
to the next scene, an apparently happy wedding day. But Vivian is marrying
another man, one with money and prestige, as David looks on, his large
eyes dark with disappointment and confusion. 

     This first, deft sequence quickly establishes the movie's interest in
the complicated connections between emotional commitment and moral
ambiguity. David's youthful, idealistic desire to do the good thing (or
rather, to know what that thing might be) is repeatedly challenged as he
encounters circumstances and people that defy traditional categories of
right and wrong. Alone at a streetside cafe shortly after the wedding,
David is approached by Diego (Jorge Perrugoria), who comes on to him with
a lively display of the pleasures of eating strawberry ice cream ("It's my
lucky day!'' he exclaims with elaborate double entendre, popping a
strawberry into his mouth). Immediately put off but also intrigued, David
agrees to go back to Diego's apartment (under patently the false pretense
of recovering photos of David that Diego claims to have). There he's
introduced to a world of small and meaningful infractions: his host
listens rapt to Maria Callas, keeps a bottle of U.S. whiskey (referred to
as "the enemy's'' drink), and reads John Donne and Vargas Llosa. 

     Alarmed (and, obviously to us, tantalized) by Diego's volatile
emotional performance and collection of contraband, David tells the story
to his college roommate, Miguel (Francisco Gatorno), who suggests that he
return to Diego's to get information for an official report on the
"faggot's'' illegal, counterrevolutionary activities. Again spurred on by
his desire to do the right thing, David does just that, visiting Diego and
gathering evidence like _Time_ magazines and books of poetry. But as he
learns more about Diego's efforts to arrange an exhibit of controversial
sculptures (Christs suffering from communist oppressions) and devotion to
artistic expression and freedom (to the point that he endangers himself by
writing an official letter of protest), David begins to doubt
Ken-doll-perfect Miguel's hardline attitudes and his own belief in the
communist revolution. 

     As this brief outline suggests, the basic narrative and moral of
_Strawberry and Chocolate_ are not exactly surprising. Like their choices
of ice cream flavors - designating their identities as straight and gay -
David and Diego's political oppositions are eventually revealed as
needlessly, artificially rigid; their developing friendship allows them
both to become more flexible, and to appreciate intimacies of various
kinds. The movie's overt prescriptions for tolerance and diversity,
however, are tempered by its thoughtfulness and humor. Made in Mexico,
Spain and Cuba, and now the official Cuban entry for the Foreign Language
Film Oscar, the movie also speaks to tolerance across a broader, and of
course highly politicized, context. 

     Extending its use of sex and sexuality as metaphors for ideological
and social differences, the movie introduces another character who's
confused about her place in the world, Diego's neighbor Nancy (Mirta
Ibarra), whom he calls the "Vigilance Lady.'' At first she does look like
the standard building busybody: she's the brash, colorful comic relief
who's inordinately curious about Diego's business and visitors, an
annoyingly trivialized version of the state's most effective repression,
its citizens' self-surveillance. But given that David is in fact spying on
Diego (at least initially), Nancy's designation as same draws an odd
connection between him and Nancy. But it's soon plain that the more
important link between them is their shared affection for Diego and their
admiration (and occasional concern) for his passionate resistance to the
government's dictates. 

     Then again, the lines - between sex and power, faith and hope - can
cross. We see Nancy and Diego cajoling - separately - their domestic
shrines, praying for David's romantic attentions. In part these scenes
serve as mini-confessions to the camera/us, as we know about their
interests in him when David does not (admittedly, he's slow on the
uptake); but on another level they underline the day-to-day intersections
of spirituality, desire, intrigue, and apprehension, all swirling together
in the Havana heat and close quarters of the apartment house. 

     The characters' increasingly complex alliances are made literal - or
at least physical - when Nancy, apparently manic-depressive and careening
between nonstop chatter and suicide attempts, slashes her wrists with a
kitchen knife. Both Diego and David contribute blood to save her. But just
as the point appears to be their bonding over her (almost dead) body, the
movie shifts gears, so that she's less a vehicle for the men's friendship
than a member of an uncommon and resourceful triangular relationship. As
choices look less and less possible under bureaucratic and ideological
pressures, they also, the film asserts, become more imperative to make. 




Cynthia Fuchs teaches film and media studies at George Mason University.

Copyright by Cynthia Fuchs.  All rights reserved.
Please do not reprint this review without the permission of the author.

This review originally appeared in the Philadelphia _City Paper_.