CHARLIE (13 min)
short documentary by Kadri Koop
SHORT SYNOPSIS
Four decades after hijacking a plane to Cuba to avoid charges of killing a state trooper,
a former black power militant reflects on his past in a letter to his nine-year-old Cuban
son.
LONG SYNOPSIS
Since hijacking a plane to Cuba in 1971 to avoid charges of killing a police officer, the
Cuban government has provided Charlie Hill refuge, allowing him to live a life beyond
the reach of the FBI. In a letter to his nine-year-old son, the film takes an intimate look
at his account of the events leading up to fleeing the US. All of it plays out against the
backdrop of the opening up of US-Cuba relations, which could result in Cuba allowing
Hill’s extradition.
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BACKSTORY
On December 17, 2014, President Obama and the current Cuban president Raúl Castro
announced the beginning of a process of normalizing relations between Cuba and the U.S.,
which media sources have titled as The Cuban Thaw. The improving relationship between
the two countries leaves the fugitives’ protection on the island nation up in the air. This
applies particularly in the case of Charlie as the New Mexico Governor Susana Martinez has
asked the secretary of the state, John Kerry to work out an extradition agreement with Cuba
so that her state could, according to her, finally bring a cop killer to justice.
Charlie tells the story of a former black power militant Charlie Hill, an Illinois-native, who
has been living as a fugitive in Cuba for more than four decades, making him the longest
living American political-asylum seeker on the island. Since hijacking a plane to Cuba in 1971
to avoid potential charges of killing a police officer, the Cuban government has provided him
refuge, allowing him to live a life beyond the reach of the F.B.I. The short film takes an
intimate look at his account of the events leading up to fleeing the US. Despite being labeled
a cop-killer and terrorist by the American media, Charlie has maintained his innocence. All of
this will play out against the backdrop of the opening up of US-Cuba relations, which could
result in Cuba allowing the extradition of all American fugitives.
In his early 20s, Charlie was part of a group called The Republic of New Afrika (RNA), which
intended to break off from the United States and found an independent Black nation. In
1971, rushing to provide protection to the other members of RNA who were attacked by the
FBI, transporting guns and explosives from San Francisco to Jackson, Mississippi, Charlie and
his two companions were pulled over by New Mexico state trooper Robert Rosenbloom,
who later was found shot to death. Based on the numerous black radicals who where
unjustly prosecuted or killed by the authorities, the three black revolutionaries in their early
twenties were concerned of the bias of the US justice system towards African Americans
decided not to risk with facing a trail.
In the 60s and 70s, dozens of American aircrafts were hijacked to communist Cuba. Knowing
that they would most probably be granted political asylum by Fidel Castro, Charlie and his
two accomplishes decided to seek exile in Cuba after learning that there was not enough gas
for flying to the originally planned destination in Africa. Charlie is the only survivor of the
three hijackers. In 46 years he has not left the island.
In the current social-political context of Cuba, Charlie’s past has little meaning to his local
friends, and it is even less understood in the American context. In a world where black
militants are feared above all, and white militants are normalized in the American media,
the details of his past are often misunderstood and actively ignored. The film will seek to
show these contradictions and explore what it means to be a black radical in the past and
how this meaning has changed in the present for him in Cuba.
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ABOUT THE FILMMAKER
Kadri Koop is an Estonian filmmaker, cinematographer and editor based in the Bay Area.
She has spent all of her independent life studying and working in various parts of Europe
and Asia from Amsterdam to Singapore. Her work experience extends from her native
Tallinn to Beijing, London and Havana. She thrives in foreign production climates and
has producing experience in Estonian, English, Mandarin Chinese and Spanish.
Having worked in TV-commercials, narrative film and independently as a documentary
filmmaker, she mixes various modes of storytelling. Kadri is drawn to character-driven
stories depicting the lives of ordinary people with extraordinary paths. Her short films
deal with an array of characters: from a gravestone maker in the Bay Area to a
community of Latin American artists in San Francisco and from a crossing guard in
Silicon Valley to an ex-Black Power militant living as a fugitive in Cuba.
Her films have screened at film festivals from the US to the Middle East, and her work
has been featured in online publications including AJ+ Español, The Atlantic Editor’s Pick
Series and Rompeviento TV.
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ABOUT THE CREW
Swati Guild is an artist and filmmaker whose projects span numerous media including
documentary film, experimental video, and photography. Swati’s previous film projects
have taken her around the world, where she has worked as a cinematographer,
producer, and editor in collaboration with artists and activists on topics ranging from
maternal health to community agro-forestry. Swati’s work has been broadcast on Al
Jazeera and Record TV Africa, featured in film festivals and used by community groups
to empower, inform, and agitate.
QUESTIONS TO THE FILMMAKER
Q: Why did you make the film?
I made the film during my last year at graduate school at Stanford. At the time, I had lived in
the US for about a year. Coming form Estonian, a racially pretty homogeneous country, I
found myself wanting to understand the race history of America. I first came across Charlie’s
story through a journalist friend, who happened to be reporting on him. I remember reading
all of the articles published on Charlie in major media outlets like CNN, New York Times,
etc., and being surprised how similar they were on reporting his story. This got me
wondering if there was perhaps a film to be made to convey another angle of him.
Q: How did you get in touch with Mr. Hill?
We happened to share a common friend, who set us up in a café in Havana.
Q: Did you have any fear in getting in touch with someone who is wanted by the FBI?
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I did and I didn’t. I didn’t know what to expect and I was willing to give it a try as my
curiosity was huge and generally I’d rather fail than not try at all. I believe in the humanity of
all people and I figured that regardless of being wanted by the authorities, people are
people. They go about their daily life like everyone else does. And I guess I was not wrong…
Q: Did you have any doubts in telling the story as a white non-American?
I was for sure conscious of the implications of making the film, as opposed an American
filmmaker of color pursuing the same project. Regardless, I came to realize that my
status as an outsider, racially and culturally, grants me certain benefits in telling the
story. When approaching the subject matter for the first time, I was compelled to
understand the other side to the media portrayal of Charlie’s story. When reading the
decades worth of newspaper articles and watching archival TV-news on the story, I
noticed the absence of accurate accounts on the attack of the headquarters in Jackson.
Instead, the only articles citing the incident in detail, where accounts published in The
Black Scholar back in the 70s. I started doing more research and released the gap in
reporting of the shootout between RNA and FBI. This was the moment when I realized I
wanted to make the film.
Q: Why does your film not go into the details of what happened that night in New Mexico
between Charlie Hill and the killed police officer?
While I had a unique access to Charlie, due to the legal case pending, he does not have the
ability to go in depth with the circumstances surrounding the murder of the police officer.
So, for me the film became about inviting the viewer to consider what pushes people to
partake in radical acts of violence regardless of the question of his quilt. I want the viewer to
be questioning if there ever is a justification for taking part in violent actions? And what is
the limit to which people can be pushed before they must take actions in defense of their
own humanity? In this way, the film is more interested in posing a new set of questions,
rather than dwelling on the question of guilt in the involvement of the killing of the police
officer.
Q: Please talk about the decisions you made as a director in telling his story?
The film takes a look at Charlie’s life within the confinement of socialist Cuba while
exploring the state of mental isolation caused by the years spent in not being understood
for his past actions. The numerous solitary scenes shot in his house and the letter provide
the backbone of the documentary. The aforementioned are woven together with fragments
of his daily life, such as spending time with his friends and son, and trying to keep up to date
with news of the outside world by scanning radio waves and watching TV. The slow
unfolding of scenes shot mainly on tripod give the sense of time spent in exile, the sedate
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nature of not knowing what the future will bring. The main scenes are split up and played
out in long passages over the course of the film culminating towards the end. Contemporary
footage of Charlie is juxtaposed with sequences of archival material, mainly newspaper
coverage, on the historical events unfolding prior and after his escape. In this way, the film
evokes the general public’s perception of Charlie’s story while also including his unique
perspective on the events. By spending time with Charlie and getting to know his complex
backstory, the film aims to provide a nuanced understanding of him and the circumstances
that lead to his current life as an exile.
Q: What were some of the difficulties you run across when making the film?
Even thought, when setting out to make the film, I was compelled to not take a stance I
realize that as a filmmaker, already by turning my camera on a person, I am taking a
stance. This realization crystalized as I got deeper in to the research and discovered the
overall lack of reporting on the attack on the headquarters by the FBI. I realized that,
similarly with me making the film on the subject, the media had taken a stance by not
reporting on this part of the story. Thus, more than trying to figure out if Charlie actually
killed the police office while going to help the other members of RNA who had been
attacked by the FBI, I was compelled to make a film that would focus on understanding
him as a young black man in the 70s America and as an older person in the present day
Cuba, living with the burden of his past.
Q: What is this film about for you?
To me, the film is about asking what would have to happen to people to be pushed into
the extent of even being accused of killing a police officer. Even though we don’t know if
he did it or not, there’s a lot to think about even in terms of what has to happen to a
person to get to a point where they are pushed to hijacking a plane to Cuba instead of
going to trial.
Oddly, in the same time, it’s also about a father-son relationship. No matter who the
person, we all love our family. The film is trying to explore this aspect of Charlie
simultaneously with his past and how the two feed into one another.