A highly political movie Blame It On Fidel charts the development of the social consciousness of a young girl called Anna in Paris. The movie opens to the scene of a wedding party where nine-year old Anna is seated at a table surrounded by all the other children at the wedding. She is teaching the rest of the kids how to peel an orange … with a knife and fork. Anna, used to the life of elegance, manners, and riches soon finds her life in chaos when her parents become full time activists – she can no longer attend her regular classes, including theological studies, at her posh school, she has to deal with absent parents but a large number of activitist strangers taking over the new smaller cramped apartment, a steady turnover of refugee nannies, and at the same time dealing with a number of social ideologies.

Nina Kervel, who plays Anna, is fantastic in her role and she really needed to be as the entire film revolved around her (I’m pretty sure she was in every shot) and her discoveries. She is both indignant and bewildered, firm on who she is yet adaptable to change in the acceptance of the explanations of those around her, strong-willed yet vulnerable, abrasive yet sweet and finally arrogant yet humble. In the end she transforms from a spoilt brat to a

The best thing about this movie that it explored a number of ideologies from communism to Catholicism to woman’s rights to Greek mythology to Vietnamese folklore and at no one time did it seek to enforce its own political agenda and present a wrong or right side. The movie was about the discovery of the fact that we all have the freedom to come to our own informed decision. Presented through the eyes of a child it was an utterly charming journey.