‘Norheimsund’ Centers on the Harsh Reality of Cuban Brides Marrying for Survival

When director and screenwriter Ana Alpízar left Havana in 2017 at the age of 27, she never imagined she’d one day return to her homeland to shoot a film about the very stories that haunted her youth. Now pursuing her MFA at NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts, the Cuban filmmaker has completed Norheimsund, a short film that confronts the realities of survival for young girls and their families in and outside the island by way of marriage to foreigners. The film will have its international premiere at the 82nd Venice Biennale, where it competes as part of the Official Selection. Not only is she bringing a story rooted in Cuba to an international stage, she’s also making history as the first Cuban female filmmaker invited to show her work at the festival, according to her team.

Norheimsund follows a present-day young Cuban girl who enters a long-distance relationship with an older Norwegian man, a romance that her mother hopes will rescue them from poverty. At first, the promise of a better life brims with hope. But as illusions shatter, the girl comes to realize that her “escape” is not as idyllic as it seems. 

In an interview with HipLatina, Alpízar explains that the story is deeply personal: “Since I was a child, I grew up hearing stories about sixty-year-old Europeans who essentially bought exotic Cuban brides with the promise of a better life,” she writes in her director’s statement. “These women were the Cinderellas of post-Soviet Cuba, seen as heroines not only for having escaped the island’s agonizing reality, but also for their potential to become providers for their families from abroad.”

The title of the film is inspired by a Norwegian she knew who visited the island and though there is a village in Norway by the name of Norheimsund, the title is more about the idea of a faraway place. Alpízar wanted to give it a title that was as foreign and far from Cuba, which could depict an often far-reaching reality for many on the island. “I chose the name because I wanted something very remote and cold, something very different from what we know in Cuba. The town could be in any country; I didn’t choose Norway or this town for a specific reason. I just tried to find a place that was ‘in the middle of nowhere.'”

Alpízar recalls an urban legend that circulated among Cuban teenagers about young brides who married foreigners. In the tale, a girl leaves the island with her new foreign husband, only for him to gouge out her eyes and send her back to Cuba, where she is condemned to live in blindness forever. Alpízar explains that this story became the inspiration for one of the film’s scenes. She says that was the story she’d heard growing up by elders who tried to dissuade young girls from marrying tourists. 

While the legend still circulates on the island, it is increasingly less of a concern for young girls seeking a way out for themselves and their families. Even women who are educated (like Yaimita in the film, whom her mother proudly notes can speak English and has received a formal education) find that these advantages offer little escape from a reality where such skills hold limited value in society.

Though the film is fictional, its themes mirror Cuba’s present-day crisis. With unlivable wages, decrease in tourism, recurring blackouts, and a mass exodus that has seen over 10 percent of the population leave between 2022 and 2023, survival on the island requires painful compromises. Alpízar’s own mother lives through hours of blackouts on the island so she understands the extent of what many women have to endure.

The phenomenon of Cuban brides long predates COVID-19, but the post-pandemic crisis has only deepened the urgency for young people to leave the island by any means possible, including marriage to foreigners. In a society where significant age gaps in relationships are often normalized, even within Cuban locals, these unions are not broadly stigmatized. Instead, they are frequently seen as pragmatic: a chance for the bride to escape, for her family to gain access to new resources and remittances, and, most importantly, for the hope that one day she might bring her loved ones out of Cuba as well. These were the nuances Alpízar hoped to convey in her film.

“Norheimsund is a door opened to a place where the brutality of circumstance can render deeply human even that which, in another context, would be unforgivable,” Alpízar explains. 

For Alpízar, returning to Cuba in January 2025 underscored the void left by the country’s ongoing exodus. Many of the peers she once knew have already departed, and the island’s creative community feels emptier with each passing year. “Cuba feels deserted,” she says. “Almost everyone I know dreams of leaving.” 

Alpízar observed that Cuban women have grown increasingly resourceful in how they connect with men online. Some, she explains, will send nude photos in exchange for having their phone minutes recharged, while others join group chats that allow foreign men to meet women before traveling to Cuba, so that they are not complete strangers upon arrival. Though a topic with many complexities, these exchanges reflect a harsh reality for many Cuban women with no viable path to success on the island and few options to leave.

Although Alpízar didn’t face major hurdles while filming, thanks to the support of local producers who helped navigate logistics, returning to Cuba to shoot Norheimsund was important. Filming on the island not only rooted the project in the country that shaped her inspiration, but also allowed her to work with Cuban actresses at a time when opportunities for them are dwindling as more and more talent leaves the country.

At its heart, Norheimsund is a story of a mother and daughter and a meditation on the fragility of dreams when survival is at stake. For Alpízar, it’s also a reckoning with the desperation so many Cuban mothers exist in that perhaps blurs the line between what feels morally right, or what they once dreamed for their daughters, to what is necessary to secure their children’s survival. 

Alpízar hopes audiences don’t walk away judging Cubans for their choices, but instead recognizing the complex realities that shape them. Above all, she wants the film to reflect the experience of a generation of Cuban youth who see little to no future for themselves on the island.

The short film, in Spanish language with Italian subtitles, will be available online throughout September via Festival Scope as part of the Venice Biennale. While U.S. availability is still being confirmed, the film is currently expected to be accessible worldwide.