“Elián” – Film Premiere & Panel Discussion
Event Sponsor
Overview
New Documentary Provides what The Daily Beast calls, “a Meditation on Human Autonomy in a World where Politics and History are Constantly Shaping Us”
Special DC Screening Co-Sponsored by CNN Films, Gravitas Ventures, and the Wilson Center’s Latin American Program
On Thanksgiving Day 1999, five-year-old Elián González was found clinging to an inner tube off the Florida coast after his mother and ten others drowned trying to reach the United States from Cuba. The wrenching custody battle that followed, pitting the boy’s Cuban father against relatives in Miami, became one of the biggest television news stories of modern times. With ground-breaking interviews and extraordinary archival footage, the new documentary feature film Elián explores that struggle and its consequences for the González family, the Cuban-American community, and U.S. policy toward Cuba.
The Wilson Center hosted the film’s first screening in Washington, DC. The film’s co-director and writer Tim Golden moderated a lively panel discussion afterwards, which featured Gregory Craig, a former White House Counsel for President Obama and lawyer for Juan Miguel González; Carlos Saladrigas, chairman of the Cuba Study group, and José Cárdenas, a former Washington director of the Cuban American National Foundation.
The panelists, all of whom were involved in the fight over Elián, were unanimous in praising for the film as an incisive, moving, and even-handed exploration of the affair. With the United States at a crossroads in its policy toward Cuba, they also noted that the film underscores the importance of reconciliation for both the González clan and the larger Cuban family divided by the Florida Straits.
Photo Gallery
Official Film Trailer
Panelists
Hosted By
Latin America Program
The Wilson Center’s prestigious Latin America Program provides non-partisan expertise to a broad community of decision makers in the United States and Latin America on critical policy issues facing the Hemisphere. The Program provides insightful and actionable research for policymakers, private sector leaders, journalists, and public intellectuals in the United States and Latin America. To bridge the gap between scholarship and policy action, it fosters new inquiry, sponsors high-level public and private meetings among multiple stakeholders, and explores policy options to improve outcomes for citizens throughout the Americas. Drawing on the Wilson Center’s strength as the nation’s key non-partisan policy forum, the Program serves as a trusted source of analysis and a vital point of contact between the worlds of scholarship and action. Read more
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