Cinematic Nightscapes: Documentary and Ethnographic Filmmaking in Cuba

Cinematic nightscapes explores how night in contemporary Cuba becomes a powerful space for political expression, imagination and artistic experimentation. Through Cuban documentary film, it examines how the night reshapes ethnographic practices and invites new ways of seeing, listening, feeling and imagining social life. Cinematic nightscapes is a sensorial, creative and audiovisual exploration of the night in twenty-first-century ethnographic and documentary film in Cuba. Against the backdrop of recurring nationwide blackouts that have plunged the country into prolonged darkness, the book examines the night as a condition that has become central to political reclamation, imaginary formation and aesthetic experimentation.Drawing on ethnographic practice and close engagement with contemporary Cuban documentary cinema, the book asks two interconnected sets of questions. How does night – with its particular atmospheres, affects and sensibilities – reshape multimodal, sensorial and creative ethnographic practices? And how do documentary and ethnographic films engage the night as a site of political contestation, marginalisation, pleasure and possibility in ways foreclosed by daylight? Moving across urban and rural settings, from politics of fun and desire to protests and nocturnal labour, the book offers a richly textured account of the obscurity of the Cuban night in all its social, material and aesthetic complexity.‘A rich, absorbing study… This is a major contribution to scholarship on Cuban cinema and the emerging field of night studies.’– Dr. Will Straw, James McGill Emeritus Professor of Urban Media Studies, McGill University‘A pleasurable must-read… an unprecedented framework for research and filmmaking that brings together nocturnal and sound ethnographies.’– Dr. Zaira Zarza, Associate Professor of Cinema, Université de Montréal‘Together their film and the book offer us a sightline to a world that for Cubans has darkened profoundly, materially and existentially.’– Dr. Susan Lord, Professor of Film and Media, Queen’s University Cinematic nightscapes explores how the darkness of night in contemporary Cuba becomes a powerful site for political expression, cultural imagination and artistic experimentation. As the rhythms of the day give way to night, a different Cuba emerges, one where protests take shape, marginalized voices reclaim space, and filmmakers reimagine ethnographic and documentary storytelling. This book offers a sensorial and creative journey through Cuban documentary films that engage with the night not just as backdrop, but as a central character—shaping emotions, aesthetics and socio-political discourse. Blending theory with rich visual analysis, Cinematic Nightscapes asks: How does the night alter ethnographic practice? How do Cuban filmmakers use the night to imagine new futures? Through a reflexive, multimodal approach, the book invites readers to experience the complexities of nocturnal life in Cuba, where darkness illuminates new possibilities.

Pagina's: 140, Hardcover, Manchester University Press (P648)