Papa: Hemingway in Cuba | |
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Directed by | Bob Yari |
Written by | Denne Bart Petitclerc |
Produced by |
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Starring |
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Cinematography | Ernesto Melara |
Edited by | Glen Scantlebury |
Music by | Mark Isham |
Distributed by | Yari Film Group |
Release dates |
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Running time | 109 minutes |
Countries |
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Language | English |
Budget | £100,000 (US$123,000) [1] |
Box office | $4.6 million [2] |
Papa: Hemingway in Cuba is a 2015 Canadian-American biographical film. It was written by Denne Bart Petitclerc, and directed by Bob Yari. The film is based on events from Ernest Hemingway's life in Havana, Cuba in the 1950s, and on a friendship that developed there between Hemingway and Petitclerc, who was then a young journalist. [3] The film received generally unfavorable reviews. [4]
In 1959, young journalist Ed Myers (a character representing Petitclerc) is working for a Miami newspaper. He wants to be a writer and had long admired Ernest Hemingway, then living in Cuba. Myers writes to Hemingway and is surprised when he answers, inviting the journalist to Cuba to go fishing with him. While the Cuban Revolution comes to a boil around them, Hemingway advises Myers on his writing. Myers continues to write articles for his newspaper, reporting on the Revolution.
An early scene from the film depicts rebels allied with Fidel Castro bursting into a street near Havana's Government Palace to confront soldiers loyal to the government of Fulgencio Batista. Hemingway and Myers take cover, with Hemingway guiding Myers through the war zone. They gradually develop a friendship and Myers spends an increasing amount of time with Hemingway and his fourth wife Mary. [5]
Petitclerc had written the screenplay and had begun working on production of the film at the time of his death in 2006. [6]
Production on location in Cuba concluded in May 2014. It was the first Hollywood film to be filmed in Cuba since the 1959 revolution, according to The Hollywood Reporter. [5] The filmmakers received permission to film inside Finca Vigía, Hemingway's residence from 1939 to 1960. The government later adapted it as a national museum. [7] Hemingway wrote For Whom the Bell Tolls and The Old Man and the Sea at Finca Vigía. [7]
The film's title, Papa, was Hemingway's nickname. He was called "Papa" by his colleagues and admirers, as well as his family. [8] [9]
Papa: Hemingway in Cuba received generally negative reviews from critics. On Rotten Tomatoes, the film has an approval rating of 11% based on reviews from 45 critics. The site's consensus quoted Hemingway's The Old Man and the Sea (1952) in concluding, "A man can be destroyed but not defeated, although the desultory Papa: Hemingway in Cuba makes one feel as if both can be accomplished by watching a single film." [10] On Metacritic it had a score of 37 out of 100, based on reviews from 17 critics, indicating "generally unfavorable reviews". [4]
Joe Leydon of Variety wrote that the film "never transcends the tropes of a formulaic biopic that views its famous subject through the eyes of a worshipful young devotee." [11] Miriam Di Nunzio of the Chicago Sun-Times gave it 2.5 out of 4 and called it "A film that is beautiful to look at but lacks clear vision." [7] Peter Travers of Rolling Stone gave it 2 out 4 and gave the film a mixed review: "Papa gives us sights to revel in. Oddly, what hurts is the clunky, overripe script." [12] Helen Verongos of The New York Times wrote: "Ms. Richardson comforts and coaxes and exasperatedly, bitingly demeans, but she and Mr. Sparks play past each other instead of engaging." [13]
Bacardi Limited is the largest privately held, family-owned spirits company in the world. Originally known for its Bacardí brand of white rum, it now has a portfolio of more than 200 brands and labels. Founded in Cuba in 1862 by Facundo Bacardí Massó, Bacardi Limited has been family-owned for seven generations, and employs more than 8,000 people with sales in approximately 170 countries. Bacardi Limited is the group of companies as a whole and includes Bacardi International Limited.
Ernest Miller Hemingway was an American novelist, short-story writer, and journalist. His economical and understated style—which included his iceberg theory—had a strong influence on 20th-century fiction, while his adventurous lifestyle and public image brought him admiration from later generations. Hemingway produced most of his work between the mid-1920s and the mid-1950s, and he was awarded the 1954 Nobel Prize in Literature. He published seven novels, six short-story collections, and two nonfiction works. Three of his novels, four short-story collections, and three nonfiction works were published posthumously. Many of his works are considered classics of American literature.
For Whom the Bell Tolls is a novel by Ernest Hemingway published in 1940. It tells the story of Robert Jordan, a young American volunteer attached to a Republican guerrilla unit during the Spanish Civil War. As a dynamiter, he is assigned to blow up a bridge during an attack on the city of Segovia.
The Old Man and the Sea is a novella written by the American author Ernest Hemingway in 1951 in Cayo Blanco (Cuba), and published in 1952. It was the last major work of fiction written by Hemingway that was published during his lifetime. One of his most famous works, it tells the story of Santiago, an aging Cuban fisherman who struggles with a giant marlin far out in the Gulf Stream off the coast of Cuba.
Andrés Arturo García Menéndez, known professionally as Andy García, is an Cuban-born American actor and director. He first rose to prominence acting in Brian De Palma's The Untouchables (1987) alongside Kevin Costner, Sean Connery, and Robert De Niro. He continued to act in films such as Stand and Deliver (1988), and Internal Affairs (1990). He then costarred in Francis Ford Coppola's The Godfather Part III (1990) as Vincent Mancini, for which he received an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actor.
True at First Light is a book by American novelist Ernest Hemingway about his 1953–54 East African safari with his fourth wife Mary, released posthumously in his centennial year in 1999. The book received mostly negative or lukewarm reviews from the popular press and sparked a literary controversy regarding how, and whether, an author's work should be reworked and published after his death. Unlike critics in the popular press, Hemingway scholars generally consider True at First Light to be complex and a worthy addition to his canon of later fiction.
San Miguel del Padrón is one of the 15 municipalities/boroughs into which the city of Havana, Cuba is divided. It is on Havana's south-eastern outskirts, stretching from Ciudad Mar to Diezmero and from Reparto Mañana to Caballo Blanco.
George Washington is a 2000 American independent drama film written and directed by David Gordon Green. Its story centers on a group of children in a depressed small town in North Carolina who band together to cover up a tragic mistake.
Finca Vigía is a house in San Francisco de Paula Ward in Havana, Cuba which was once the residence of Ernest Hemingway. Like Hemingway's Key West home, it is now a museum. The building was constructed in 1886.
Denne Bart Petitclerc was an American journalist, war correspondent, author, television producer, and screenwriter.
Havana is a 1990 American drama film starring Robert Redford, Lena Olin, Alan Arkin and Raul Julia, directed by Sydney Pollack with music by Dave Grusin. The film's plot concerns Jack Weil (Redford), an American professional gambler who decides to visit Havana, Cuba to gamble in 1958 on the eve of the Cuban Revolution.
Bob Yari is an Iranian-born American film producer and director.
The Crook Factory is a thriller novel by American author Dan Simmons. The book was initially published by William Morrow on March 1, 1999. The novel tells a fictionalized version of the real life counter-espionage and spy ring, known as the Crook Factory, that was set up by Ernest Hemingway in Cuba during World War II.
Modelo Brewery, designed by the Cuban architect Enrique Luis Varela, was built in 1948 for Compañia Ron Bacardi S.A. Its address is the corner of 52 and Carretera Central, Cotorro, Havana, Cuba. In 1952, Ernest Hemingway featured Hatuey beer in his book The Old Man and the Sea. When he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature, the company threw him a party at the Modelo Brewery. Hemingway was a frequent patron of the brewery since it was located near to his home in Havana at Finca Vigía.
The Hotel Ambos Mundos is a hotel in Havana, Cuba. Built with a square form with five floors, it has an eclectic set of characteristics of 20th-century style architecture. It was built in 1924 on a site that previously had been occupied by an old family house on the corner of Calle Obispo and Mercaderes in Old Havana. It is a frequent tourist destination because it was home to the popular writer Ernest Hemingway for seven years in the 1930s.
Havana, Cuba, is a host city to numerous events and festivals.
Ernest Hemingway owned a 38-foot (12 m) fishing boat named Pilar. It was acquired in April 1934 from Wheeler Shipbuilding in Brooklyn, New York, for $7,495. "Pilar" was a nickname for Hemingway's second wife, Pauline, and also the name of the woman leader of the partisan band in his 1940 novel of the Spanish Civil War, For Whom the Bell Tolls. Hemingway regularly fished off the boat in the waters of Key West, Florida, Marquesas Keys, and the Gulf Stream off the Cuban coast. He made three trips with the boat to the Bimini islands, wherein his fishing, drinking, and fighting exploits drew much attention and remain part of the islands' history. In addition to fishing trips on Pilar, Hemingway contributed to scientific research, including collaboration with the Smithsonian Institution. Several of Hemingway's books were influenced by time spent on the boat, most notably, The Old Man and the Sea (1953) and Islands in the Stream (1970). The yacht also inspired the name of Playa Pilar on Cayo Guillermo. A smaller replica of the boat is depicted in the opening and other scenes in the 2012 film Hemingway & Gellhorn.
Cooper & Hemingway: The True Gen is a 2013 documentary film about the 20-year friendship between writer Ernest Hemingway and film actor Gary Cooper. Written and directed by John Mulholland, it is narrated by actor Sam Waterston with actor Len Cariou as the voice of writer Ernest Hemingway.
The Ernest Hemingway International Billfishing Tournament is an annual fishing tournament held in Cuba. The tournament was established by American author Ernest Hemingway in 1950. Regularly held in May or June, it has been described as the "highlight of Cuba's fishing year" and regularly attracts anglers from as many as 30 countries.