One of the most visually astounding films ever made, Mikhail Kalatozov’s (The Cranes are Flying) radical Cuban-Soviet co-production I Am Cuba is a soaring revolutionary fever dream transposed to celluloid. Over four episodes, a portrait of working class Cuban life on the verge of change is presented in frenetically wandering long takes glimpsed through stark wide-angle lenses: a young woman hoping to marry her boyfriend unhappily leads a double life as a sex worker for rich Americans, a farmer is robbed of his home and harvest when the landlord sells out to a major corporation, a cell of rebellious students plot to assassinate the chief of police and another farmer must decide whether to remain at peace or join the armed struggle.

Famous for its ‘impossible’ funeral procession long take and cinematographer Sergey Urusevsky’s radical use of lightweight cameras with deliriously wide lenses, I Am Cuba is a landmark piece of political cinema and an exceptionally crafted propaganda piece that has gone on to inspire generations of filmmakers. The film bares criticism from some for being a Soviet view of the Cuban experience and an overly zealous take on Fidel Castro’s movement while on the other hand Che Guevara praises the film as “the best of the coproductions that we’ve done... an artistically important... poetic film, often moving... In its images, we can recognise ourselves as a people”. After a cold release the film was largely forgotten and only later rediscovered in the west after the fall of the Soviet Union, recently being restored in 4K and looking better than ever before. Flourishing with images still unsurpassed, there is nothing quite like it – an essential viewing for all.