Part documentary, part feature film, Tomas Gutierrez Alea’s Memories of Underdevelopment portrays an important segment of Cuban life during the period 1961-62. Centered on Sergio (sergio Corrieri), a wealthy former businessman-turned-aspiring-writer, the movie considers his relationship to the transformation of Havana into a communist dictatorship organized around a police state. Always his interactions with the people and landscapes of home are informed with the pallor of disbelief, sadness, and neglect, but also of optimism because Sergio is in touch with his disconnection while trying to make himself whole once again.
First seen sending his parents and ex-wife to a new life in Miami, he instead stays behind, hoping to find genuine reminders of what it is to be alive. So he begins typing a manuscript, including fantasies about his maid, recollections of his lost true love, and the beginning of a troublesome dalliance with the lovely Elena (Daisy Granados). Eventually accused and acquitted of rape after narrowly avoiding a shotgun wedding-a parable about individual freedom in a state-run justice system with corrupt values-Sergio finally resigns himself to waiting and seeing what may come of his country’s revolutionary fervor.
Layered with voiceover narration, Alea peppers the account of Sergio’s life with frequent discourses on various subjects. There is an illuminating monologue about the Marxist dialectic, curiosity about the struggles of aging in a tropical climate, the general theme of underdevelopment, and social inconsistency during the early days of Fidel Castro’s reign.
Perhaps Cuba’s most internationally famous film, and directed by one of the founders of the state-run film studio, the Instituto Cubano del Arte e Industrias Cinematograficos (ICAIC), Memories of Underdevelopment is a trenchant critique of capitalism and the Communist Revolution. Within its simple story of one man in crisis are elements of fantasy, rolls of newsreel footage, and poignant bits of situational drama to express simultaneous wonder and contempt at the upheaval of the Cold War. Elegant and powerful, it’s a tribute to Cuban creative influence in a moment of acute cultural suppression as the mask for a better tomorrow. --Garrett Chaffin-Quiray (1001)

Hailed as one of the most sophisticated film ever to come out of Cuba in the early days of Castro’s revolution, Memories Of Underdevelopment (listed at number 54 on Derek Malcolm’s 100 Greatest Movies) follows Sergio (Sergio Corrieri - Soy Cuba) through his life following the departure of his wife, parents and friends in the wake of the Bay of Pigs incident. He observes the constant threat of foreign invasion while chasing young women all over Havana before finally meeting Elena, a young virgin girl he seeks to mould into the image of his ex-wife, but at what cost to himself?
Even though director Tomás Gutiérrez Alea was a staunch and devoted supporter of the revolution, Memories of Underdevelopment makes an uncompromising analysis of the newly formed system of government. Through a moving blend of narrative fiction, still photography and rare documentary footage, Alea catalogues the intricacies of the early days of the Castro regime; producing a stirring and enigmatic work that feeds from the culture of the very subject it is studying; Cuba.