Jan 19, 2008 7:45 am US/Eastern
"Shoot Down"
MIAMI (CBS4) ―
In the mid- to late 1990s, thousands of Cuban refugees attempted to cross the Florida Straits by whatever means available - small boats, homemade rafts and inner tubes. Only one in four rafters made it to U.S. shores, with thousands dying at sea.
A volunteer group based in Miami called "Brothers to the Rescue" was formed to patrol the waters in small civilian aircraft, offering aid to rafters.
On February 24th, 1996, the Cuban government authorized two military fighter jets to attack and destroy unarmed civilian American aircraft over international waters.
In the aftermath, four Americans were killed.
Winner of the 2007 Sonoma Film Festival Award for Best Documentary, "Shoot Down" is the first feature length film to tell the complex story behind one of the most pivotal events in U.S.-Cuba relations. It is a story of diplomatic relations, human rights, the fortitude of family and the the search for truth.
First-time director Cristina Khuly, a first-generation Cuban-American whose uncle – Armando Alejandre Jr. - was among the four victims, spent 10 years of research, government documents, transcripts and never-before seen news footage of Fidel Castro to supplement hundreds of hours of original interviews in recounting the events leading up to and following the shoot down.
On Friday evening, the film premiered at the
Olympia Theater at the Gusman Center for the Performing Arts. Khuly
told CBS4 Michele Gillen, "It just paints a very real portrait of a horrible moment, but a moment that's important."
Maggie Alexandre Khuly, whose brother Alejandre was one of those shot down, said of the movie, "The message for my brother would be, we are still at it. We won't stop. We'll get justice someday, somehow. The older people might die out, but younger people are coming along, and they'll keep on looking for it. They'll get it, and tell the story.
Among the film's moments are the use of actual voice recordings from the MIG pilots and their controllers in Havana, and the cockpit recordings from the doomed Cessna planes, edited to re-enact the shoot down itself.
The film has been three years in production, and will open in select cities on January 25th.
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