15 minutes of fame?
Invisible Rider is one of our men in Miami.
While following the steps of Juanita Castro he ran into an interesting character: Waldo Diaz-Balart.
This is an uncle of the Diaz-Balart brothers, as you recognized the family hyphenated moniker. He was named after Ralph Waldo Emerson because his mother admired the author, as you know in that family they got with those names, kind of out of whim, which is fine with me.
This fellow was an actor in a movie about the life of Juanita Castro shot by Andy Warhol in 1965, one year after Juanita left the workers paradise and went to live with sister Enma in Mexico, from where she came to the States.
So, do you believe that Waldo Diaz Balart didn't know who Juanita was and that he didn't know that she was a fervent fidelista, until a fall out with big bro in mid 1964? Hard to believe, they are family and they very well know each other.
So, the Diaz Balart family has not been that removed from the kasstro family as they have made you believe....
How is that the patriarch of the family let his son to be part of such a movie?
Let's run some refresher on Juanita, according to Wikipedia:
Juanita, like all the Castro siblings was active in the Cuban revolution, buying weapons for the 26th of July movement during their campaign against Fulgencio Batista. After the revolution Juanita felt betrayed by the growing influence of Cuban communists over the Cuban government. In 1964 she left Cuba staying with her sister Enma in Mexico city before emigrating to the United States.
Now, let's see what's up with the movie:
It's been said to be the most intellectual film by Andy Warhol.
Accodirding to the critics, "the Life of Juanita Castro" is a satiric comment on kastro. How satiric? well, Warhol seemed to have had a warped sharp sense of humour, usually a chemically enhanced sense of humour to begin with. The film didn't denounce the crimes of Castro for sure, it was just an "artistic statement".
This is an excerpt from a comment on the movie:
The most intellectual of Warhol's movies, 4 March 2001
Author: Matthew Wilder (e-mail deleted) from Los Angeles
"Warhol , it is reported, had a brilliant stroke of invention. Ronald Tavel, the co-director, staged this absurdist romp about Castro and Che Guevara in a single crowded space, with all the actresses (it is an all-female cast) (Wow, this guy mistakes Diaz Balart for a woman!) facing front. Tavel sits among them, telling them what to do and say. Warhol moved the camera from a head-on position to the side. He created the sadistic triangle that exists in all his movies. On one side, the spectator. On the other, the actor. On the third side, some unseen force--i.e., Warhol himself--to whom the actors look in supplication and hate. Apolitically surrealist, vaguely racist, and as formalist as a
Messiaen essay on birdsong, JUANITA CASTRO exists almost exclusively from the neck up. (The grim, overcast cinematography may be party to this.) An etude on politics and theatre as exercises as seen and less-seen control, CASTRO doesn't pretend to be
brainless in the way most Warhol movies do. Still, it strikes me as no loss that Warhol gave up "having something to say."
Most contemporary audiences will find this tough going. But something about this mass of seated women, gazing offscreen in a collective CLOSE ENCOUNTERS stupor, feels timelessly compelling."
So, a Diaz Balart in a vaguely satiric movie about the castro family, in a movie that is not a denounce of the crimes of the dictatorships? How can you remove from the horrendous crimes of the first years of castroism in this way, so fast?
Why this particular Diaz Balart was also at Juanita's business this morning?
While following the steps of Juanita Castro he ran into an interesting character: Waldo Diaz-Balart.
This is an uncle of the Diaz-Balart brothers, as you recognized the family hyphenated moniker. He was named after Ralph Waldo Emerson because his mother admired the author, as you know in that family they got with those names, kind of out of whim, which is fine with me.
This fellow was an actor in a movie about the life of Juanita Castro shot by Andy Warhol in 1965, one year after Juanita left the workers paradise and went to live with sister Enma in Mexico, from where she came to the States.
So, do you believe that Waldo Diaz Balart didn't know who Juanita was and that he didn't know that she was a fervent fidelista, until a fall out with big bro in mid 1964? Hard to believe, they are family and they very well know each other.
So, the Diaz Balart family has not been that removed from the kasstro family as they have made you believe....
How is that the patriarch of the family let his son to be part of such a movie?
Let's run some refresher on Juanita, according to Wikipedia:
Juanita, like all the Castro siblings was active in the Cuban revolution, buying weapons for the 26th of July movement during their campaign against Fulgencio Batista. After the revolution Juanita felt betrayed by the growing influence of Cuban communists over the Cuban government. In 1964 she left Cuba staying with her sister Enma in Mexico city before emigrating to the United States.
Now, let's see what's up with the movie:
It's been said to be the most intellectual film by Andy Warhol.
Accodirding to the critics, "the Life of Juanita Castro" is a satiric comment on kastro. How satiric? well, Warhol seemed to have had a warped sharp sense of humour, usually a chemically enhanced sense of humour to begin with. The film didn't denounce the crimes of Castro for sure, it was just an "artistic statement".
This is an excerpt from a comment on the movie:
The most intellectual of Warhol's movies, 4 March 2001
Author: Matthew Wilder (e-mail deleted) from Los Angeles
"Warhol , it is reported, had a brilliant stroke of invention. Ronald Tavel, the co-director, staged this absurdist romp about Castro and Che Guevara in a single crowded space, with all the actresses (it is an all-female cast) (Wow, this guy mistakes Diaz Balart for a woman!) facing front. Tavel sits among them, telling them what to do and say. Warhol moved the camera from a head-on position to the side. He created the sadistic triangle that exists in all his movies. On one side, the spectator. On the other, the actor. On the third side, some unseen force--i.e., Warhol himself--to whom the actors look in supplication and hate. Apolitically surrealist, vaguely racist, and as formalist as a
Messiaen essay on birdsong, JUANITA CASTRO exists almost exclusively from the neck up. (The grim, overcast cinematography may be party to this.) An etude on politics and theatre as exercises as seen and less-seen control, CASTRO doesn't pretend to be
brainless in the way most Warhol movies do. Still, it strikes me as no loss that Warhol gave up "having something to say."
Most contemporary audiences will find this tough going. But something about this mass of seated women, gazing offscreen in a collective CLOSE ENCOUNTERS stupor, feels timelessly compelling."
So, a Diaz Balart in a vaguely satiric movie about the castro family, in a movie that is not a denounce of the crimes of the dictatorships? How can you remove from the horrendous crimes of the first years of castroism in this way, so fast?
Why this particular Diaz Balart was also at Juanita's business this morning?
1 Comments:
Great post !!
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