Brit Marling
Issue #24
The young director documents the quest for Cuban freedom in Boxers and Ballerinas
By Rebecca Flint-Marx
Published: June 1st, 2005 | 4:41pm
When Brit Marling was a Georgetown junior, she planned to become an investment banker. That is, until her friend Mike Cahill called to ask her to look at some photos. They were photos of Cuba, and they made such an impression on Marling that she dropped out of school and headed to Havana with Cahill, some cameras, and a couple of laptops. Their idea was to film the hopes and struggles of young boxers and ballerinas, whose vocations give them something few Cubans possess: the freedom to travel outside of Cuba.
Filming in both Havana and Miami, where they profiled two Cuban American boxers and ballerinas, Marling and Cahill made the aptly titled Boxers and Ballerinas. The documentary is a vivid, fascinating look at the lives of four athletes and dancers who are divided by a body of water but united by their desire for a better life. In addition to winning widespread festival acclaim, it has given Marling, now 22, a better direction for her talents than, say, a lifetime spent at a Wall Street brokerage house.
So what about those photos inspired you to drop out of school?
There was one of a boxing compound in central Havana. It was stunning: one ring in a crumbling building with no roof. Little kids with huge boxing gloves looking at the camera so defiantly, with so much confidence and aggression. You look at the images and ask, “What are these kids doing?” In Cuba, you don’t go into boxing because you love the sport. You do it because you have to: it’s a vehicle for leaving the island. I was fascinated by the idea and its contrast with the female counterpart of ballet.
Being from Florida, did you know much about Cuba before you went there?
I was 120 miles away, and yet what you learn in Florida public schools is nothing. All these loaded code words — Castro, communism, red — you never learn what they mean. We’re not even fully cognizant of the fact that you’re not allowed to go there — we’re not at war, but there’s no cultural exchange.
What were your first impressions of Cuba?
When I got off the plane, I was shuffled into a room where women were asking lots of questions. They ended up confiscating my hard drive, which reinforced my impressions of the place. But once you get out of the airport, the stretch to Havana is sort of surreal. There are old factories that look like they’re shelled out from a war. There was so much exhaust in the air; it was like a delusional trip.
Did you have a lot of government interference?
They assigned us two press attachés — which basically have nothing to do with press, because there is no press in Cuba. They made sure we didn’t film anything to show Cuba in a bad light. But we became best friends with one of them. He didn’t understand exactly what kind of film we were making but thought we were good and honest people. In the end, he gave us unprecedented access to [places where] we were not supposed to be. Like, we could film at a boxing competition but couldn’t go to the boxing champion’s neighborhood because he’s living in a concrete shack with no roof above the kitchen.
So what are you up to now?
Distribution would be a huge help. The film is far more marketable than any of us had imagined. We have been in talks, but we want to wait until we get through [other festivals] to see what kind of buzz we can continue to generate. I want to do a fiction feature next and spend more time at the forefront of a project. So many indies are about relationships or dysfunctional families or youthful angst or drugs. If I make another film, I want it to exist for a purpose.
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