It was a cold, bright and clear afternoon this last Sunday in February.
After a very good lunch at Jamie’s Italian in Covent Garden, rounded off with a warming glass of calvados, we headed through the streets of central London towards the ICA on Pall Mall.
ICA’s screen 1 was packed for this afternoon’s showing of Havana Club Rumba Sessions: La Clave.
We arrived just after the trailers had started, and the only seats still available were right at the back. I wasn’t expecting this documentary to pull such a big audience.
Narrated by Gilles Peterson, with eloquent and insightful contributions from Crispin Robinson Ade Egun, ‘Havana Club Rumba Sessions: La Clave’ gives a wonderful overview of rumba and its place in Cuban culture.
It’s good that for at least one part of the film they get away from Havana and travel to the city of Matanzas.
Too many films about Cuba treat the city of Havana as if it is the only point of interest in the whole country, so credit to this film for making the effort to go beyond the over-familiar clichéd images of Havana and show us something of the rest of the country, even if it’s only a few short scenes.
Cuban singer Daymé Arocena is the perfect guide for Gilles Peterson as he delves into the rumba culture. Not only is she a great, charismatic singer, she also exudes a warmth and vitality that enlivens the whole film.
There’s always a risk with such documentaries that they begin to feel like a school lesson in which we should be taking notes, but that doesn’t happen with this film.
Gilles Peterson explains the evolution and the intricacies of rumba with a light touch that tells us a lot about the culture without ever dropping into ‘worthy but dull’ mode.
The three main styles of rumba – guaguancó, yambú and columbia – are shown through some fantastic performances by musicians and dancers both traditional and contemporary.
Some of the scenes end a little abruptly and could have been given a little longer to allow the music to build in intensity, but I guess that’s a choice the producers made in order to keep the overall running time to a digestible 73 minutes.
‘Havana Club Rumba Sessions: La Clave’ is a wonderful film and when it ended there was a happy buzz amongst the audience as everyone exited the cinema.
As we came out of the cinema just after six pm the sky was a brilliant deep dark blue, the last of the day’s light contrasting vividly with the bright whitewashed buildings lining The Mall.
Related Posts: ‘Miles Ahead’, Picturehouse Central, London; ‘We Like It Like That ’, Picturehouse Central, London