Dale-40

Georgie Anne Geyer's book on Castro was one of the sources for this "Fidel," which I saw just last night on cable. I know a lot about this really good reporter on Latin American affairs, who was at Northwestern University in Evanston, IL, a few years before I majored in journalism at the University of Illinois in Champaign-Urbana.

And also I was in college from 1957-1961, a college with students from all over the world, and I was hearing a lot about Battista in 1958 and 1959 and why he should be ousted.

In three hours anyone who sees this version of "Fidel" can gain insight into why and how Castro gained power in Cuba. His excesses have come from not wanting to lose that power.

The scene that has me ready to travel to Santa Vittoria shows hundreds of villagers in four lines snaking down from the mountaintop village through the vinyards to the Roman cave where a million bottles of wine can be hidden from the Nazis. The camera pauses on the faces of the villagers -- extras who must actually be from that area of Italy. The faces look real and so does the village. Could the story be based on a real incident? I've been searching for that answer since seeing the film at Turner Classic Movies the first weekend of February 2000.

Aspiring directors -- even if it's only family movies with a camcorder they plan to make -- should see this documentary on how the master film maker created magic. Bergman knew what he wanted before he planned each scene. So have many other directors. And some of the actors who worked with some of these other directors never made another film again. Bergman got his favorite actors to come back film after film, because he knew how to get them to do takes over and over again without destroying their egos. His work with the two children is especially touching. "My sister and I giggled like that," he told the youngsters playing Fanny and Alexander.