Kleines Tropicana - Tropicanita (1997) User Reviews

A collection of whacky characters and an intricate plot

[Zsofi · 8/10 · 20 November 2000]

I saw this film last Friday at the International Movie Club (Cinema International). It was still a very good evening though the copy was less then perfect. A thoroughly entertaining movie with a collection of whacky characters and an intricate plot. Some said that this movie reflects current conditions in Cuba (i.e. chaos) but even if you don't want to go this "deep" into the film, it has more than enough to entertain anyone. I would recommend it to those who don't mind that they can't leave the room for a snack because then they would miss some of the twists and turns of the story.

Small movie, huge mess

[GMeleJr · 9/10 · 5 March 2000]

The low budget KLEINES TROPICANA overwhelms the viewer with an unfathomable number of characters, subplots, plot twists, and covert messages. I saw this movie as a result of the publicity it received in Germany. I couldn't believe the reviews were as bizarre as they were. I wanted to see what the fuss was about. Well, the director of ALICIA EN EL PAIS DE LAS MARAVILLAS (Alice in Wonderland) was once banned in Cuba for his films' underlying criticism of the regime. He reunites here with some of the ALICIA group for another pretentiously clever social satire, masquerading as Latin American realist cinema. Even the most ardent fan of the genre, fluent in Cuban Spanish, will have to watch and rewind the film several times, and take notes on the myriad of characters just to understand it. I watched it twice, read the "wise" introductory "quotes" three times, and had to see the ending three times. This is not a spoiler. The ending brings back each character, adding a couple we never saw, and adds a "witty" epitaph about each one. KLEINES TROPICANA or TROPICANITA (Little Tropicana), one can only assume, represents a microcosm of Cuban life, a small Havana or "Tropicana," the country's most famous nightclub. The characters who inhabit this film include policemen, grave robbers, old Nazis, neo Nazis, a dwarf, a drag queen, government cultural directors, Santeria-healers, a rapist, and an aging "internationalist lover" who has screwed herself around the world, and has apparently retired in Havana. The movie basically is recounted by a policeman's report about the death of a Havana-born German man who was found dead in a bird's costume (feathers and all) in an important Havana grave, revered by locals as a "holy site". The cop (Vladimir Cruz) tells a blasse' boss about the supposed murder of Hermann Pangloss. The police chief is totally bored by the entire story. You probably will be too. The German critics were right. What a bore!