Musical Revolution in Cuba and Ohio

Belcon’s queenly Omara—modelled on the actual Omara Portuondo, who is showcased in Wenders’s film—is spiky, remote, set in her ways. She’s lived through the history that de Marcos can evoke only nostalgically in reference to the songs he loves. Those songs remind Omara of real people and real events, political interludes whose senselessness and brutality have left unmusical lacunae in her life. Now she’s curt and uncollaborative—perhaps the best indication of her current state of mind is that she sings not with a live band but over a prerecorded track. She’s not a musician to make friends. Not anymore.