A New Look for The Front Door

One of the most significant changes made on the Home Page (cuba.htm) is the removal of the left side div which, for years, was the place where the logo would hang out. On small screens the div would disappear and the logo would relocate to the very top.

Removing it wasn’t an easy decision to make, but combined with other changes, it allowed for a more stream-lined page.  

The left side was there for over fifteen years, serving the larger screens of the time and going through various cosmetic updates along the way. But now that screens are both larger and smaller than ever, it’s time for an evolutionary change.

This change would invoke CSS grid and Flexbox to power the page. A new version of the home page is currently being developed, tested (and cursed at—in Spanish) for the near future. Here’s a peak, though it’s not quite ready for prime time.

But first, as they say in morning news, a little something about a 17-year-old home page that has recently retired.

Seventeen years is a long time for a home page (the “front door”). Over the years it has featured different looks, and for a brief time at the beginning, it even included pictures of Fidel Castro and Che Guevara.

Those were the early days, during the Clinton Administration, when I was still in denial about the hate that existed towards the only names and faces widely recognized in the U.S. as “Cubans.” A friend suggested that I use a picture of “Ricky Ricardo” instead.

“You mean, Desi Arnaz?” I said to her.

“Who!? No! Ricky Ricardo. Lucy’s first husband.”

The third most recognizable Cuban at the time was not even remembered by his own name. And the 2^nd most recognizable Cuban (Che) was born in Argentina. Castro and Che were evicted off the Home Page and replaced by Martí and Maceo. It didn’t matter that Americans didn’t know who they are. I would gladly tell them.

Eventually, as the site grew, the Front Door and the Timetables became the most worked pages.  

An early Home Page (Front Door) made
with HTML tables

Initially both were built with clumsy HTML tables for layout.  This early screenshot shows a tables layout with a JavaScript gallery showing a Martí stamp. At the top, next to the logo, a mouse-over effect invites you to wave the Cuban flag.

At some point David-Siegel-like single-pixel-Gifs were everywhere. I remember staying up nights with Siegel’s first book considering how to improve the look of the site.

As the specifications for HTML evolved, so did the timetables, though not the Front Door. The new HTML 4.01 pages (on the timetables), built with CSS and embracing floats and positioning became, almost by accident, mobile-friendly. The effort to adhere to the demands of assisted technologies paid off in unexpected ways, though I didn’t really “get it” at the time.

Today, the new CSS Grid frontdoor seems an awfully serious decision. Here’s what’s happening;

While I know what I want the small screen to do and look like (a variation of the current one shown at left, but more streamlined) it’s the large screen that’s giving me trouble. It’s always easier to throw things on top of each other than to assemble them into meaningful coherence.

Background Image

A background “hero” image is loaded with the body, depicting true heroes of Cuban history inone of their most heroic moments;

.bod2 {
background-image: url(http://historyofcuba.com/images/New/HoC-NewCover-4.jpg);
 background-repeat: no-repeat;
 background-position: center center;
background-attachment: fixed;
-webkit-background-size: cover;
-moz-background-size: cover;
-o-background-size: cover;
background-size: cover;}   

   Martí on the left side to greet us, with rebels behind him… this image appears at screens at least 600 pixels wide and disappear from smaller screens.

I used this image because of its “history” with the site. “Crossing of the Trocha, Jan 1, 1896,” symbolizes the relentless struggle for independence inspired by Martí and led by Maceo and Gómez… the image has been desaturated a bit for the front door.

Part of the central image is repeated on the .article2 div (without Martí) that appears on screens 1200 pixels or higher. The image links to the Gallery page in which this image is further explored.

On pages 900 pixels wide, Grid-template areas provide for a 6-column, 4-row grid, leaving the left area open for Martí.

 grid-template-columns: repeat(6, 1fr);

    grid-template-rows: 80px 180px 1fr 90px;

    grid-template-areas:

    " . header header  header  header  header"

    " . mainbar mainbar article article sidebar"

    " . article2   . article3 article3 sidebar"

    " . search footer footer footer footer";

The grid-template-areas reassemble themselves d for different screen sizes, leaving out sidebar1 and article2 from the smaller screens.

Firefox screen shot shows grid-template-areas

Various grid items feature semi-transparent colors (rgba) to separate and isolate the section. This includes article3, article, sidebar and mainbar. This is still in the testing stage.

SEARCH

The search window appears at the bottom… I want the visitor to glance through my offerings before they go searching for stuff. On the other places where it is used (contents.htm & content2.htm) the Google Search appears at the top right.

I don’t recall when the Google Search was established, but it must be approaching legal age and it still works like a Laker point guard in their prime.

Screen breaks come at screen widths of 500, 600, 800, 900 and 1200 pixels. Aside from reorganizing the grid-template-areas, they mostly adjust font sizes …

A Chrome screen shot shows the basic idea for the page

Along the way I came across various peculiarities in how the same exact page displays on Firefox and on Chrome…

On Chrome the page lays out as expected… and it shrinks as you’d want it to. The Firefox page is a different story.

Once established, this layout may be used on different menu pages… with slight variations relating to different site topics. I can’t wait to get there.

Maceo in Havana, Part 2

The Director

Excited by the possibility of updating and rewriting my screenplay about Antonio Maceo, I began to re-visit books by Syd Field and Robert McGee and others that promised to unleash the secrets of successful screenwriting… I also started reading screenplays with more frequency, even if they had nothing to do with waging war or achieving independence from a mean and powerful empire.

Some screenplays I couldn’t put down, such as Tarantino’s “Reservoir Dogs.” And others I enjoyed more than the actual movies, such as Steve Martin’s “LA Story” and Tarantino’s “Natural Born Killers.”

Lucky for me the San Francisco Public Library had lots of screenplays I could borrow, and many screenplays were now appearing in book form.

But, even if the screenplay was properly completed and I was to get a producer or agent in HollywoodLand to read it, and buy it, who could direct it?

Tarantino and Maceo are a great match, but Maceo also matches well with African-American directors such as John Singleton or F. Gary Gray or Antoine Fuqua or Spike Lee. These guys may be a better choice, since they’ve not announced a formal retirement from making movies.

Still. Imagine the headlines: “Tarantino postpones retirement to direct a movie about Antonio Maceo.” One thing I like about him is his willingness to remind us of the racist nature of our culture… hidden from textbooks and denied blatantly by its most visible supporters. (I refer mostly to the brilliant dialogue in “The Hateful Eight” and the plot to “Django Unchained.” Yet, to this day, my favorite Tarantino movie may still be “Jackie Brown.”)

One thing I dislike about him is his willingness to change facts for the sake of dramatic accent marks. “Inglorious Basterds” being my case-in-point. The memory of Maceo demands that his story be told with honesty. (Not to blame it all on Tarantino, but there are many that probably believe this is how WWII ended.)

Mario Van Peebles made a Western (“Posse”) that I liked at the time but was panned by critics. It featured a black man returning from the Spanish-American War to seek revenge on the man who lynched his father.  Van Peebles’ film seems much more relevant today, as our President revives the racist feelings America nurtured in private while not saying the “N” word in public. I looked up Roger Ebert’s review from 1993. He’s still one of my favorite film critics. Except, of course, for those times when he’s completely full of shit, as he is with “Posse” (and with “Death to Smoochie” in 2002).

Ebert’s review of “Posse” hints at potential problems with a movie about Maceo. He clearly acknowledges that the story “needs to be told.” “It is a West not often seen in Hollywood movies,” he adds in reference to the presence of black people in the real West but not in the celebrated Hollywood Westerns of yesteryear that came before his time. (I will look up what Ebert had to say, if anything, about those Westerns.) Then he obliterates the film; “Unfortunately, Van Peebles is never able to find a clear story line and follow it.” Ouch… this hurts more because it’s not true. “The movie is action without meaning, violence without the setup that would make it meaningful.”  

Denying our racist history is a well-practiced artform. Now more than ever. We all know its there, we just avoid discussing it. 
I usually enjoyed Ebert’s reviews. But let’s not forget that, like most critics, he was sometimes completely full of shit.

Richard Price’s screenplays were also lots of fun to read, and I enjoyed William Goldman’s as well, including “Magic.”

I began to really think that I could finish my screenplay, that my original flawed attempt was not that far off the mark… that if I abandoned the academic nature of the timetables I could create a film about Maceo that could gain something like the popularity HE had with Black Americans in his time… (some used “Maceo” as a first name for their male children).

Dreamer-logic seemed to be on my side… I was the perfect person to write a movie about Maceo. I spent over a decade researching Maceo and his role in Cuban history… I was a natural movie-lover and story-teller… and I was convinced that Maceo’s bravery on and off the battlefield would inspire new generations.

But simple logic does not a movie make anymore than simple math a U.S. Presidential election decides.

I was warned against a 2^nd act scene in which Maceo and Spanish General Santocildes have a brief conversation and Maceo expresses that he would never accept Cuba falling into the hands of the U.S. Empire, which was also Martí’s fear, and what actually happened after their death.

Brad Pitt could act the hell out of General Santocildes, the proud Spaniard who faced Maceo in battle years earlier and has a great deal of respect for the Cuban… and he knows it is almost inevitable that they will face each other in battle again. (Don’t ask me what happens. You’ll have to see the movie.)

In the past decade things have changed in Hollywood, which suddenly seems much more Democratic than Washington. Even if it’s only dollar-Democracy. Suddenly even the Academy Awards seem multi-cultural.

The same world-wide audience that embraced “The Black Panther” would love Maceo in Havana.  

How to sell Maceo In Havana to the public

Today, the world is much more sympathetic to Cuba than our public media would admit.  

And this is where Hollywood’s dollar-Democracy could benefit the memory of Antonio Maceo.

Almost a full century before Castro, Maceo faced the Spanish Empire with fierce devotion and was embraced by Cubans for it. But he became so hated by the Spanish Empire, in that special way that only empires know how to hate, that they wanted to kill him.

In between the failed 10 Year War (1868-78) and the Final War for Separation from Spain (1895-98) the empire sought to rid itself of Maceo through numerous assassination attempts. (Castro still holds the record.)

The natural elements in our story provide an easy “sell” in a post-Black Panther market:

·       Indigenous people fighting for independence

·       Battles on horseback

·       Overdressed Spanish royalty, with black-slaves-dressed-in-white, decrying their God-given right to rule The Pearl of The Antilles ­­

·        Near-naked rebels with clubs and machetes

 Blacks and Whites joining hands for freedom

·        A small but proud neighbor country establishing its own identity through independence from an oppressive regime

·        Lots of bloody machete attacks   

·       Fires, explosions, executions

·       Maceo’s battle call “Al machete!”

·       José Martí’s speech at Steck Hall!

·       More in-house fighting than in all the “Avengers” movies combined

·      The final expulsion of the Spanish Empire from the Americas!

You could easily reassemble these bullet-points into a Marvel 3-D extravaganza that could add billions to Disney’s pockets. (I’m sure there’s still room in their pockets for more.)

Netflix or HBO or Amazon Prime also could score big with this project. Right now, there isn’t a single movie about Antonio Maceo, even though his life featured (naturally) all the things that the top-grossing motion pictures of the past ten years have in abundance: violence, heroics, blood, explosions, romance, betrayals, tragedy, relentless scumbags, traitors and backstabbers, needless human suffering and brief moments of celebratory happiness. And it isn’t fantasy from a publishing conglomerate, but a true story of a people still fighting for their independence.

Can what remains of the traditional Hollywood Studios make such a movie? Or is it up to the new guys?

Will a big-screen film about Antonio Maceo lead to peace and harmony throughout the world? A time of commerce and trading unlike any in history?

Please don’t answer that.

NEXT: Who would play Antonio Maceo?