Latino Selection

Elian – USA – Cuba (2017)

Directed by:  Tim Golden and Ross McDonnell

As the new millennium began, one news story captured the attention and hearts of nearly every American. On Thanksgiving, 1999, a young Cuban boy named Elian Gonzalez was found floating in the Florida Straits by himself after his mother drowned trying to seek refuge in the United States. Before long, the 5-year old Gonzalez became the centerpiece of an intense custody battle between his father back in Cuba and his relatives in Miami, which, in turn, brought attention to the long-brewing tensions between Fidel Castro’s Cuba and the United States. Throughout the news coverage though, one voice was too young to join the heated international conversation – that of Elian himself. Eighteen years later, in the wake of Fidel Castro’s monumental death last November, the now 23-year-old Elian tells his story, along with the other key players, of one of the biggest news events in modern times.

Elian premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival on April 21, 2017

Print courtesy of The Film Collaborative