AbouT
TRT: 52 MINUTES
PRESENTED BY RED DOOR VIDEO PRODUCTIONS & PIRANGA FILMS
What makes someone leave everything and everyone they know and love, and forego their familiar culture, to make their way into an unknown future in an unknown land? What makes someone stay where they live despite hardship and deprivation?
This documentary follows several Cubans from different walks of life who love their country but struggle with the conflict to stay or leave an increasingly dysfunctional government and rapidly collapsing economy.
Filmed in 2024 and 2025, Island of Dreams brings a human face to the international crisis of migration.
The Making of the Film
The directors of Island of Dreams, Cliff Orloff and Alvaro Jimenez, went to Cuba in 2024 to make a documentary about modern Cuban music.
They met and interviewed many talented musicians and listened to some great music, but did not find a story about modern Cuban music that would make for a good documentary film. What they did find was much more interesting – a disillusioned society that no longer believed in or trusted the Communist government or the promised Socialist Revolution, and were suffering during a period of sustained economic collapse.
They went back in 2025 and visited with many of the people they met the previous year. Through the eyes of the Cubans they met, Orloff and Jimenez were able to film a story about what is happening in Cuba today. Their characters are Cuban, but their voices are universal.