In 1994, after local protests against his regime had reached a fever pitch, Cuban leader Fidel Castro made a surprising announcement -- that any ships that wished to leave Cuba would not be stopped by his seagoing forces. Before long, dozens of jerry-rigged vessels were attempting to make the 90-mile journey to the United States across shark-infested waters, but American president Bill Clinton responded by announcing the Cubans would not be given asylum, while those who had already arrived were
sent to a refugee camp in Guantanamo Bay. The Cuban expatriates at Guantanamo Bay had to wait nine months before they were allowed to enter the U.S. and begin the long process of finding new homes in America. Filmmaker Carlos Bosch followed the stories of the Cuban exiles, and, in 1999, tracked down a handful of them to see how they had fared in their first five years in their new country. Balseros is a documentary which shares the stories of the Cuban settlers and the surprising places (both good and bad) where the dream of freedom has taken them. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi
Despite its unique Cuban elements, Balseros gets much of its power from the way it turns out to be a classic story of immigrants coming to a golden land and finding the streets paved with baser materials.
Here are a handful of fairly ordinary people who happen to be from a crippled island with a deteriorating economy, who earn our sympathy just by being themselves.
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