WillSushyMedia This movie was so-so. It had it's moments, but wasn't the greatest.

Humaira Grant It’s not bad or unwatchable but despite the amplitude of the spectacle, the end result is underwhelming.

Kaydan Christian A terrific literary drama and character piece that shows how the process of creating art can be seen differently by those doing it and those looking at it from the outside.

Roxie The thing I enjoyed most about the film is the fact that it doesn't shy away from being a super-sized-cliche;

mrcwshbrn4 Story-line is fresh, even after all these years. Mitchell is OK, the lady is not too good, the bad-guy 'Fernando' is well acted. Set construction is B-grade, with several goofs. Script and dialog are a little better than you would expect. Simple action scenes are on par for this kind of movie. Overall production is about what you would expect for a B-grade movie. Some real shots in/near Havana add a special touch to the film. Trying to protect Castro from pro-Baustista forces seems a bit odd these days, but probably spot-on for 1959. The cast all seemed to work together well.Good, rainy-day film.

MartinHafer Cameron Mitchell plays an American who has come to Castro's Cuba in order to locate a friend who has mysteriously disappeared. The police are quite nice and helpful but Mitchell's life is constantly at risk due to evil counter-revolutionaries. In addition, Mitchell's old girlfriend and their past relationship together is a simmering subplot.This film was made during a tiny window in which the American film industry fell in love with Castro's Cuba and the Cubans moved towards Communism and repression. Errol Flynn made a couple films about this Cuba and "Pier 5, Havana" is another--odd little American relics where the new government was seen as very good and reasonable.Seeing this film and its very idealistic view of the new Cuba is pretty interesting. Here in Castro's new utopia, the police allow people to walk around town with handguns, they don't send suspects to political prisons and there are no purges and executions. Instead, the bad guys are all the counter-revolutionaries bent on undoing the recent revolution and a bringing about a return of the Batista government through violence and murder.Now all this is naive, but at the time it looked like this could be the new Cuba--so I can forgive this. However, what I had more trouble with was the occasionally bad dialog and awkward plotting. Now I am NO saying it's a bad film--it's just not a very good one. I'd recommend it more as an unusual curiosity as opposed to a good film.HORRIBLE Cliché WARNING: At the end, Mitchell catches the bad guy and is holding a gun on him. Does he shoot this dangerous man? NOPE! He drops the gun to duke it out man-to-man! Also, CONVENIENTLY, the lady's husband just happens to die so she and Mitchell can have each other. The way this is handled is SUPER-awkward.

elavigne7885 TCM aired this movie the other morning. For around 45 years,this film has not shown up an the TV or released on DVD or video. Filmed in Havana,Cuba in 1959,this film makes mention on how the United States helped Fidel Castro and his followers oust the Batista government and put Castro in power. As it turned out,that was a big mistake for the United States. Rumours circulated that the U.S. government purchased all the copies of this film and destroyed them. Well,not true. Turners classic movies has a copy. As for the film,their in nothing really interesting to see. Other than Cameron Mitchel,and lessor known actress,Allison Hayes,this film was filmed on a cheap budget.

django-1 This is one of three low-budget programmers made by Cameron Mitchell for director Edward L. Cahn and the same production company (all UA releases) in 1959-60, all of which are worth seeing. Living in Miami, small businessman Cameron Mitchell comes to post-revolution Havana to find an old friend who was going to come and work for him, but never arrived and seems to have vanished. Although Mitchell's character is not a detective, this plays a lot like a detective film, and director Cahn is a master at pacing, so despite the miniscule budget (Havana is evoked by a few small sets and a few California exteriors with Spanish-language signs on them!), the film plays like a good little paperback-original mystery novel--especially so since Mitchell provides voice-over narration here and there to speed things along and to mention things that would be too expensive to show on camera. As always, Mitchell treats the role with the greatest respect, digging into the character and turning what could have been a generic role into someone the viewer cares about and roots for. Michael Granger is also excellent as the honest, professional Cuban police investigator who stays on the case himself and keeps running into Mitchell along the way. The film also features legendary 50s leading lady Allison Hayes (Gunslinger, The Unearthly, Attack of the 50 ft. Woman)as a woman who once knew Mitchell and was married to the missing man. Although a low-budget programmer that is only 67 minutes long and was no doubt made in a few weeks, PIER 5, HAVANA provides good, honest, hard-boiled entertainment and plays like a good 1950s detective TV show. Director Edward L. Cahn was the best kind of journeyman director, a true pro who could take a talented cast, a few small sets, and a genre-based script, and turn it all into a solid, unpretentious feature film that still entertains and engages decades after it was made. If you come to this film with enough willing suspension of disbelief, it won't matter that the punches thrown in the fight scenes miss by at least eight inches--the sound effects are synched accurately so you THINK the punch must have landed, and the scene has moved on before you have time to analyze it. I'll take honest entertainment like this over CGI effects any day of the week. This film was probably made for less than the bottled water budget on the last Eddie Murphy film. Bravo to director Cahn and star Cameron Mitchell!