JOVEN HABANA

“Ancient cobblestone. Vintage cars. Historic forts”.  In a city marketed for its nostalgia and fetishized for its decay, where does the zest of youth fit in? 

 

Joven Habana is a short fiction-film inspired by the realities of young people growing up in Old Havana as they try to figure out who they are and who they want to be, and find solace and inspiration in each other when everyone else seems to fail them. 

 

The film is a product of the creativity and initiative of a group of young Cubans (ages 13-18) who formed the Popular Theatre collective by the same name while participating in a Canadian research study on the role of free time in adolescent development. 

 

Geopolitics, structural violence, and the cyclical nature of poverty and delinquency set the backdrop for this intimate story about young people struggling to make sense of themselves, and to find the people that make sense to them, in a city whose youngest heroes are more than half a century old.