This movie was presented as part of the Miami Film Festival at Miami Dade College. You can follow its Facebook page to find out about future screenings.

Sin La Habana is the story of a young Cuban couple wanting to leave the island. Leonardo, played by real-life ballet dancer Yonah Acosta, and Sara (Evelyn Castroda O’Farrill), conclude that the only way they can get out of Cuba is if Leonardo seduces one of the women that he teaches in his Salsa class and gets her to take him to Canada with her. The plan is for him to stay married until he gets his papers and then do whatever is needed to get Sara out. Unsurprisingly, a few things in such an elaborate and lengthy plan don’t work out as expected.

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Also in the movie, directed by Kaveh Nabatian, are Iranian-Canadian actor Aki Yaghoubi, as Nasim, and  Julio Hong, as Julio.

Themes like racism, religion, and sex tourism are part of the movie, although at its center is a relationship between two people doing what they can to achieve their goals. There’s a bit of music, a bit of Santeria, and a bit of that practice of marrying for convenience that we have seen from the American side, but less often from the angle presented in this movie. 

Sin La Habana is 95 minutes long, in Spanish, English, with English subtitles. It was filmed in Canada and Cuba and it’s not rated.