Matthew

La Lucha portrays the Cuban struggle by paralleling the lives of two boxers in Havana: 7-year-old Daniel dreams of becoming a national boxing star, and Evelio is a 45-year-old former combat-sport champion who now works multiple jobs to make an adequate living. Through the intertwined narratives of two generations, we see an intimate expression of the Cuban people’s ambitions hampered by the realities of living in a country that has been undergoing economic siege for the past 60 years. Unlike Evelio, Daniel has yet to realize the real fight lies not within the ring, but beyond.

Beneath the glitzy and glamorous landscape that characterizes the UAE, this ethnographic documentary explores the hidden reality of partition spaces — apartments with subdivided rooms — and the lives of their resident migrant workers, who comprise nearly 90% of the UAE’s population. Offering a never-before-seen view of the everyday in the Gulf, this observational piece provokes critical questions about migration, wealth, loneliness, aspirations — themes especially relevant to a contemporary global society characterized by ever-growing movement between the global South and North.