Introduction

Reflections of Nonnormativity: Photography, Childhood, and Belonging in Mariana Rondón’s Pelo malo

“…The filmmaker herself has wondered whether the film offers any reason for hope or simply reveals her own pessimism, but she has also expressed a desire for it to generate dialogue in an extremely polarized country (García and Belinchón, 2013). The focus on Junior’s experiences is significant because, as Rocha and Seminet (2012: 3) contend, “as young characters move the story forward, they are usually objectified as vehicles of adult anxieties over the nature of civic society.” They add that “beyond simply representing adult anxieties, [films] may actually attempt to produce, play with, or reshape these anxieties.” The film’s heartbreaking resolution may thus be more effective than a positive one at generating a productive dialogue through which social anxieties pertaining to nonnormativity can be reshaped toward an acceptance of it.…”

“…Furthermore, Junior’s positive valuation of the image of the fair-skinned boy and rejection of that of the dark-skinned boy highlight the implications of the racialized aspects of idealized subjecthood for the construction of normative boyhood. The film’s focus on childhood is important because, according to Rocha and Seminet (2012: 17), it constitutes “an allegory of the nation, a site where a panorama of difference—sexual, ethnic, class, and political—must negotiate a complex, and often hostile, social landscape.” This negotiation represented by the juxtaposition of the boys in the two photographs—one smiling broadly, dressed as a civilian, standing gleefully against a leisure backdrop, the other serious, dressed as a soldier, holding a rifle against a military backdrop—reveals that boyhood is a privilege that is not afforded to Afro-descendants. The photograph of the Afro-descendant child places him on a path toward accelerated adulthood.…”

“…Furthermore, the mirror reflections underline Junior’s position as both focalizer and focalized. Rocha and Seminet (2012: 4) explain that “the former term indicates the perspective, or point of view, from that something is being seen, and the latter is the object being seen or focused on.” Junior’s mirror reflections are thus key to the cultural work that the film does as the child focalizer/focalized forces adults to question their own ideologies by scrutinizing their actions.…”

Not Child's Play: Tactics and Strategies inViva CubaandHabanastation

“…Viva Cuba has been widely celebrated as the first Cuban film for children, ‘by children’ – given the fact that Cremata ‘encouraged creative contributions from his young stars’ (Rocha and Seminet, : 12) – with Habanastation explicitly proclaimed as following in its footsteps. This quasi‐generic categorisation is significant, as it has led to the ascription of universal values, qualities and appeal to both films.…”

“…The ambiguous status of Habanastation and Viva Cuba as idiosyncratically Cuban and/or ‘universal’ narratives about children makes them into focal points for reflection not only on our various understandings of the child, but also on the status of films as cultural products in a highly commercial medium. After all, as Carolina Rocha and Georgia Seminet note in their discussion of the burgeoning corpus of Spanish and Latin American films featuring children and adolescents, the use of children's ‘universal appeal’ is related to both economic and moral imperatives to go beyond the national audience (Rocha and Seminet, : 15). By comparing Pierre Bourdieu and Michel de Certeau's theorisations of practical action, I will suggest that the production, distribution and marketing of these films for children, about children demonstrates that they cannot be seen as ‘merely’ child's play.…”