Identity is the essential core of who we are as individuals, the conscious experience of our interior. (Kaufman cited in Anzaldúa, 1987, p.84) The objective of this project The essay will be to interpret the identity contradictions produced in the film Fresa y Chocolate and The Borderlands. When personal identity is stifled and shaped by nationalist discourse. By examining the polarized dichotomies of self-identity, juxtaposed with the internalized and dominant hegemonic discourse of imposed national and cultural identity. The article will endeavor to expose how the holding and exercise of power creates conflicts and revolts between individual identity, when opposed to a dominant and oppressive structure. The article will first examine Fresa y Chocolate's depiction of how the desire to express one's individuality and personal identity clashes with the widely accepted, yet orchestrated and imposed, post-revolutionary Cuban national identity. . By studying how the discourse prescribed by a Cuban autocratic regime creates an emotional battlefield for individual expression. When opposing the dogma surrounding what it means to be a good and contributing member of a socialist collective. The article will reveal how Diego and David's intertwined personal journeys create a world of forced discovery and a transformed realization of identity for both. Next, the article will examine how internalized self-identity must be a dynamic and fluid battlefield. Dominated by a pragmatic desire for survival. How this need for acceptance and existence manifests itself in a complex network of control and subjugation. The result is what Anzaldua describes in The Borderlands as the creation of a world of multiple forces...... middle of paper ....... I want the freedom to sculpt and chisel my own face, to stop the bleeding with ashes, to fashion my own gods from my insides. And if I am denied return home, then I will have to stand up and claim my space, creating a new culture – a cultural mestiza – with my own wood, my own bricks and mortar, and my own feminist architecture. (Anzaldua 1989, p. 44) Works Cited Anzaldúa, G. (1987) Borderlands/La Frontera: The New Mestiza, San Francisco: Aunt Lute Press. Birringer, J. (1996) “Homosexuality and the Nation: An interview with Jorge Perugorria”, The Drama Review, 40(1), 61-76. Gutiérrez Alea, T. (1993) Fresa y chocolate [film], Cuba: ICAIC.Wilkinson, S. (1999) “Homosexuality and the repression of intellectuals in “Fresa y chocolate” and “Mascaras”, Bulletin of Latin American Research, 18(1), 17-33, available: Jstor database [accessed October 17 2012].