Recent political changes in Cuba, including expanded accessibility to personal transportation and loosening restrictions of trade and tourism with the U.S., have put a fresh light on the country’s car scene. Popular YouTube channel Mighty Car Mods just released a beautiful documentary on the culture, the people and the cars of the communist state.
Cuba was cut off from the capitalist world when Fidel Castro took power in 1959, leaving the country’s roads as a snapshot of 1950's Americana and forcing people to innovate and eventually mix with the utilitarian boxes of the former Soviet Union. Cuba and its car culture now finds itself front and center in the big Western blockbuster franchise that is Fast & Furious.
I suspect that the eighth installment of the franchise, which includes The Rock kicking a ice-skating torpedo into a truck at one point, isn’t going to do the people of Cuba justice, but here’s a documentary that does.
Cuba is perhaps the one place in the world where automotive intelligence hasn’t faded—it’s not allowed to. Instead it has flourished into a beautiful quagmire of car parts and culture; a stream of a crazy alternate reality just a few miles south of the rest of the world.
Check out the documentary from Mighty Car Mods below:
The production quality is incredibly high compared to the YouTube I grew up with, but Marty and Moog and their automotive misadventures have always been maaaaad. This documentary takes it to a new level though, and I’m excited to see the guys move into more amazing spotlights like this.