In 1956, Larita is a sixteen-year-old who shares a ramshackle home on the outskirts of Havana with her mother and her aunt’s family, a place where dreams feel both vivid and precarious. From their garden they can glimpse Ernest Hemingway’s white mansion, a constant reminder of a larger world beyond their daily struggles. Inside, she decorates the walls with posters of Elvis Presley and Tony Curtis, signaling a spark of personal ambition that clashes with a family mired in hard work and limited resources. In school, she shines in English, and a hopeful teacher’s suggestion that she enter a scholarship competition to study in the United States fills her with bright expectancy. She also quietly begins to date a classmate, Victor, a boy who is pushing to form a student association and who embodies the tension between youthful aspiration and the pull of everyday life.
A visit to a bookshop delivers a concrete dream when she is given a copy of The Old Man and the Sea. She devours the novel, drawing sharp parallels between Hemingway’s tale and her own family’s quiet sail through poverty, and she records her reflections in a diary that keeps her courage alive. At home, her relatives tease her for prioritizing study over the family’s meager needs, yet she remains resolute. Financial strain intensifies when she is sent home from school for not wearing the correct uniform, highlighting the social barriers that stand between her and opportunity. Still, she presses on: she passes the first round of scholarship exams and is invited to a reception for the finalists. With the care and resourcefulness of her relatives, she makes herself presentable, aided by sewing skills and her grandmother’s sacrifice—pawning treasured earrings to buy fabric.
The news of being shortlisted makes her tell Victor, which stirs tension because he feels left out and fears what a year apart might mean for their relationship. That night, the family’s principal breadwinner is abruptly fired from his job as a policeman, a blow that underscores how fragile their already fragile finances have become and how every potential opportunity is filtered through poverty.
At the scholarship interview, a new hurdle appears: her illegitimacy and the lack of strong social connections that would yield letters of recommendation threaten to derail her chances. In a moment of desperation, Larita resolves to seek a reference from Hemingway, only to discover he is away in Africa. This disappointment deepens her sense of injustice, and she bluntly blames her mother for the structural barriers that poverty and stigma impose on her future. When she pretends to be sick to skip school, her favorite teacher, Dr. Martinez, stops by to offer encouragement. In a moment of candid wisdom, he reminds her that her life is not wholly defined by shame or deprivation: > You’re not exactly living under a bridge.
As the school year progresses, student protests swell into a climactic push to boycott classes, and Victor is arrested as part of the upheaval surrounding the campus, presenting a stark picture of resistance under pressure. Yet amid the turmoil, Larita’s determination to pursue education persists, grounded in the quiet belief that a different life could be within reach.
Later that year, a practical turn arrives when Larita takes a job at a coffee bar, keeping pace with the uncertain rhythms of life in Havana while still holding onto the possibility of a scholarship abroad. Near Easter, a chance encounter with the scholarship administrator, who recognizes her, rekindles a flicker of hope. They exchange a brief, loaded exchange—mutual recognition without promises—ending with a simple, well-wishing note for the holiday. The film closes on a moment of cautious optimism, where personal ambition meets the stubborn resilience of a young woman navigating poverty, legitimacy, and the stubborn pull of a distant dream.
