Cinema of Cuba

Cinema of Cuba
Cine Praga in Pinar del Rio, Cuba
Number of screens	313 (2009)
• Per capita	3.0 per 100,000 (2009)
Main distributors	Dist. Nac. ICAIC 100.0%
Produced feature films (2009)
Fictional	8
Number of admissions (2011)
Total	2,230,200
Gross box office (2006)
Total	CUP 2.45 million
National films	CUP 1.36 million (55.7%)

Cinema arrived in Cuba at the beginning of the 20th century. Before the Cuban Revolution of 1959, about 80 full-length films were produced in Cuba. Most of these films were melodramas. Following the revolution, Cuba entered what is considered the "Golden age" of Cuban cinema.

After being popularised by the brothers Louis Jean and Auguste Marie Lumière, the cinematographe traveled through several capital cities in different American countries before arriving in Havana, which occurred on January 24, 1897. It was brought from Mexico by Gabriel Veyre. The first presentation was offered at Paseo del Prado #126, just aside the Teatro Tacón. Four short films were shown: Partida de cartas, El tren, El regador y el muchacho y El sombrero cómico. The tickets were sold at a price of 50 cents, and 20 cents for kids and the military. Short after, Veyre performed a leading role in the first film produced in the island, Simulacro de incendio, a documentary centered around firemen in Havana.

In this first phase of introduction there were several locations devoted to cinema: Panorama Soler, Salón de variedades o ilusiones ópticas, Paseo del Prado #118, Vitascopio de Edison (in the famous Louvre sidewalk). The Teatro Irioja (today Teatro Martí) was the first to present cinema as one of its attractions. The first in a long list of movie theatres in Havana was set by José A. Casasús, actor, producer and entrepreneur, under the name of "Floradora", later renamed "Alaska".

In the six or seven years before World War I, cinema was expanded and stabilized as a business in the most important cities in Latin America. Cuba, just as the rest of the countries in the continent, went through those first years with itinerant and sporadic exhibitions, changing from European providers to North American providers, starting the dependency on the big Hollywood companies.