Each year, the Massachusetts Multicultural Film Festival, sponsored by the Interdepartmental Program in Film Studies at the University of Massachusetts, offers students, faculty and other movie-lovers from the surrounding Five College Area a chance to view cutting-edge films from around the globe. The festival will continue this week with its theme, ‘Beyond Walls,’ with the showing of Cuban documentary ‘The Sugar Curtain,’ directed by Camila Guzm’aacute;n Urz’uacute;a.

In her autobiographical debut film, director Camila Guzm’aacute;n Urz’uacute;a reflects on growing up during the ‘Golden Age’ of the Cuban Revolution. Through visits to her elementary school and other memorable places from her childhood, Guzm’aacute;n Urz’uacute;a recalls a time when Cuba provided education, healthcare, work and housing ‘- a time when Cuba was like a paradise.‘

The film ‘[offers] a provocative historical perspective on the Cuban Revolution,’ said festival curator Catherine Portuges.

Guzm’aacute;n Urz’uacute;a was born in Santiago de Chile in 1971 but left with her family in 1973 after a coup. She spent her childhood and adolescent years in Havana and left in 1990, shortly before the collapse of the Soviet Union.

The collapse of the Soviet Union found Cuba in economic crisis, one in which food rations and illegal jobs were necessary for survival ‘- a world different from the one Guzm’aacute;n Urz’uacute;a grew up in and remembers.

Guzm’aacute;n Urz’uacute;a was shocked by the state of Cuba when she returned in 1994, and it was this visit that inspired her to make ‘The Sugar Curtain.’

‘And it was then when I started to have this kind of need of recuperating the country of my childhood that wasn’t there anymore and had been real. And people were beginning to forget about it, in a way,’ said Guzm’aacute;n Urz’uacute;a.

She decided to make the film in 1999 she ‘realized that Cuba had completely changed.’

Guzm’aacute;n Urz’uacute;a currently lives in Argentina. She studied film in Paris at Les Ateliers Varan and in London at the London College of Printing and Distributive Trades. She has worked on a number of films since 1996, which include Amalia Escriva’s ‘Pablo Neruda,’ Carmen Castillo’s ‘Mar’iacute;a Felix, la Do’ntilde;a,’ Patricio Guzm’aacute;n’s ‘The Pinochet Case‘ and Ricardo Larra’iacute;n’s ‘El Entusiasmo.’

She wrote and directed the documentary, ‘La Voie de Thomas,’ with Les Ateliers Varan in ‘ Paris in 2002. ‘The Sugar Curtain’ is her first full-length feature film.

Released in 2005, ‘The Sugar Curtain’ has been showcased in festivals around the world. The film was shown in the 2007 Havana International Festival of New Latin American Cinema, the 2007 San Francisco International Film Festival, the 2007 Tribeca Film Festival, the 2007 Cin’eacute;ma du R’eacute;el, the 2007 Berlin International Film Festival, the 2006 Toronto International Film Festival and the Buenos Aires International Festival of Independent Cinema.

The film was chosen Best Documentary at the 2007 Havana International Festival of New Latin American Cinema and was awarded the FIPRESCI Award at the Buenos Aires International Festival of Independent Cinema.‘ The FIPRESCI Award is given out to reward what the International Federation of Film Critics see as enterprising filmmaking.

‘The Sugar Curtain’ was made in an effort to hold onto the happy memories of a place that is now stricken with disease, violence and corruption.

‘Everybody was surprised when I used to say that I was happy when I was in Cuba, and I had a happy childhood. For me, it was important to keep that in a little box, somewhere in my heart. I had this kind of necessity. My country disappeared, and it was important not to forget it,’ said Guzm’aacute;n Urz’uacute;a.

‘The Sugar Curtain’ is playing free of charge tonight, Feb. 25, at 7:30 p.m. in room 137 at the Isenberg School of Management. It is a part of the ongoing Multicultural Film Festival, which is in its 16th year. This year, the theme is titled ‘Beyond Walls,’ filmmakers who explore the post-socialist era through their work.

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Nora Crocker can be reached at ncrocker@student.umass.edu