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There is a thing that happens with songs where when you've heard them enough times, you stop hearing them at all. They are less pieces of music than cultural baubles that pop up to stand for styles or sentiments or eras. Long ago, "Tomorrow" became not just the song that stood for Annie, but for many people – both those who like musicals and those who don't – a song that stood for precocious children belting earnestly to the patient exhaustion of nearby adults. Consider the scene in Nora Ephron's You've Got Mail where the wealthy family of Joe Fox (Tom Hanks) listens to its charming preteen sing the song with nervous, imperfect happiness. It's not just a song; it's an anthem of young girls with big voices, and young girls with small voices who dream of having big voices.

I was six years old when Annie opened on Broadway in 1977. I was in the sweet spot: a generation in which a lot of girls took that music to heart – "Tomorrow" and "Maybe" and "Hard-Knock Life." We had the cast album, and I knew all the words, and I still do, because that's how it works. I can't remember TV shows that aired in 2012, but if I play "You're Never Fully Dressed Without A Smile" in the car, my mind and my voice retrieve it intact, like a warm blanket from a cedar trunk. I didn't even know what a lot of these words meant then – "Who cares what they're wearing on Main Street or Saville Row?" – but they're in there anyway.

It would never have occurred to me at that age that I might have more easily seen myself in that record, that show, that iconic image of the little girl with the big voice, because like practically every little girl I saw in popular culture, she was white. The original musical Annie is a period piece set during the Great Depression, but aside from the one scene where she put on the fluffy red hair, the Annie in the photos I saw looked a lot like me. Don't get me wrong – plenty of little girls loved Annie who weren't white, and plenty of boys loved Annie, and so forth. But when you're a little kid, it doesn't hurt to have commonality with the people being presented to you as cultural icons. Or maybe it's better to say it can hurt, I think, to almost never have it.

There is already a perfectly good filmed version of Annie that's charming, straightforward, well-executed, and quite faithful to the original musical, if that's what you're after. It's not the 1982 film directed by John Huston – that one is pretty bad. It's the 1999 version made for television, starring Victor Garber as Daddy Warbucks, Audra McDonald as Grace, Kathy Bates as the mean Miss Hannigan, Alan Cumming and Kristen Chenoweth as her rotten brother and his girlfriend, and Alicia Morton as Annie. (Note: It was directed by Rob Marshall, whose Into The Woods is about to open.) That is a good production, and we don't necessarily need another along those lines.

The new film is not along those lines; it is pretty radically different. Directed by Will Gluck, it stars Quvenzhane Wallis as Annie, Jamie Foxx as Warbucks replacement and tech mogul/mayoral candidate Will Stacks, Rose Byrne as Grace, Bobby Cannavale as a political consultant who functionally takes the place of Rooster, and Cameron Diaz as Miss Hannigan. It's been doubly updated: the musical was a 1977 piece about 1933; this is a 2014 piece about 2014. Here, Annie is not living in an "orphanage," per se, but in a crowded foster home where Hannigan, still an alcoholic and now a refugee from a busted music career, warehouses kids in exchange for meager assistance checks. (Diaz is a hoot, and I had to respect the way the joke about her past in a band pays off with one late joke that seems to justify the entire runner.) When Stacks and Annie have a chance encounter, Cannavale's conniving operator persuades him that taking a foster kid into his home for a while will win him votes.

If you love the original musical, know that this is not that. The music has been largely transformed into sweetened, highly produced modern radio pop, which I personally find enormously less pleasurable than the original songs. Some songs have survived largely intact, particularly the opening trio of "Maybe," "Hard-Knock Life" and "Tomorrow." But beyond that, it's mostly numbers that nod at the original music before veering off into songs that are either entirely new for the film or so different that you'll barely recognize them. "You're Never Fully Dressed Without A Smile," for instance, is here only as a Sia pop rendition used to score a fantasy scene. The score frequently includes pieces of songs that are never actually heard, as if to reassure the audience that this is not forgetting the show's roots, but specifically acknowledging them and setting them aside. Whether you find that actually reassuring probably has a lot to do with your perspective.

It seems fair to point out, though, that if the new music is vulnerable to the accusation that it sounds too produced and synthetic, the original presentation of Annie on Broadway was vulnerable to musical digs of its own. Certainly, your classical singers would have dropped their teeth at young Andrea McArdle's high belting chest voice, which really does sound at times like it would hurt to sing that way for very long. Returning to the original cast album makes me warmly nostalgic, but also makes me sympathetic to adults who felt at the time that they were listening to entire songs made up of children yelling. We may be in a time of enthusiastic snark, but we did not invent the tsk-tsking of the displeased, particularly in the case of entertainment for children.

Despite any reservations about the music, it is a charming, lovely little movie. Wallis, who was nominated for an Oscar for Beasts Of The Southern Wild, remains a naturally affecting young actress, and her Annie retains the ingenuity and resilience that is more important to the character, in the end, than the Depression setting and the red hair. What has always been most poignant to me about Annie was her conviction, deep and real, that her parents were gone only temporarily and would return for her. And the film's way of conveying that, which takes Annie back over and over to the only place she can think of to wait for them, is quite touching.

What they do with Jamie Foxx as a germophobic entrepreneur (he's quite funny) is necessarily different from the model of Daddy Warbucks, old-school rich dude. But there are interesting trade-offs that come out of the updating process. While I much prefer the original's "N.Y.C." to the new film's "The City Is Yours" when it comes to songs about the draw of New York, the song isn't the only thing about that scene that changes here. In the original, "N.Y.C." is a comfortable rich man's salute to the city he loves, sung as he wanders through it: "The city's bright as a penny arcade; it blinks, it tilts, it rings." Warbucks represents established royalty; in order to capture New York's appeal to strivers, they throw in a verse from an aspiring actress: "N.Y.C., tomorrow a penthouse that's way up high; tonight, the Y."

Here, "The City Is Yours," on the other hand, finds a black billionaire in his helicopter arguing the city's promise to a young black foster kid: "Now's the time you've gotta stand tough; cause if you work hard, you can rise up." Life is, of course, not that simple. But while I don't love the new song, that new dynamic between the characters is perhaps more interesting and relevant than revisiting the New Deal would have been. (The original show actually features FDR making the cabinet sing "Tomorrow" and has a song called "A New Deal For Christmas," which is literally about ... the New Deal.) Stacks is sort of both Warbucks and the actress in that sequence – speaking to both the dream and the hustle it takes to get it. He is having a more substantive conversation with Annie than comes out of just showering a kid with stuff. "Rise up." "Stand tough." There's a consciousness in that scene of the odds Annie is actually facing that's largely missing from the fully fantasy-bound original.

Gluck is a director with a history of making films that are better than they could have been in other hands: 2011's Friends With Benefits, starring Justin Timberlake and Mila Kunis, is a solid contemporary romantic comedy, and 2010's Easy A, with Emma Stone as a high school student dealing with rumors about her sex life, is terrific. I don't think Annie is quite as interesting as either of those, but it's fun, and it's funny.

The endearing thing about "Tomorrow," despite all that's happened to it over the years, is that when you actually listen to it, its ideas are elemental: Most things are not the end of the world. There are chances for things to go better. Hope is real. I could be possessive and sniffy and negative and I could catalog the differences between what I loved more and what I loved less. But every generation deserves its own Annie, pressing that idea that hope is real in whatever way reaches them the best. Different ways at different times, hopefully looking like different little girls. Is it a great movie? No. Am I glad they made it, and did I enjoy it? Yes.

This week's historic agreement between the U.S. and Cuba to reinstate diplomatic relations after decades of silence could launch a digital revolution in the island nation.

According to the White House, only 5 percent of Cubans have access to the open Internet, comparable to North Korea. As part of the deal, that could change overnight.

Status Check

Maribel Fonseca a teacher in Miramar, Cuba, has never seen the Internet. A few of her more privileged students have been online.

"I work in a school where members of the military and foreigners and top people in the country are," she says over a terrible (and very expensive) phone connection. "They use it. They go shopping, they see things I haven't seen."

What she wants to see most is her family. Fonseca's sister lives in the United States, and it's been more than a decade since they've seen each other. Her voice lights up at the idea video-chatting with her.

"I can guarantee if I could have Internet at home, I'd talk to my sister every single day. I wouldn't miss a minute of her life. I love her so much," she says.

Aidil Oscariz, a Cuban who lives in Miami, says students back home ask people abroad, like her, for the latest research papers, and even for news about Cuba. State-owned media doesn't report reliably on crime or corruption, but underground bloggers leak stuff out.

"Sometimes I have actually found out things that are happening in Cuba before some of my family members [there] have," Oscariz says.

Government Influence

Cuba's only telecommunications company, ETECSA, is government-controlled. This week's announcement could mark the end of that monopoly, and pave the way for free-market competition and growth.

"I don't know that the Castros are ready for an information revolution," says Alec Ross, who was a senior adviser on tech issues for the U.S. State Department. "But they're a couple old men. They're going to die sooner than later. And I think that they're trying to salvage something."

Ross, now a fellow at Columbia University's School of International and Public Affairs, says Cuba won't just light up with bandwidth immediately. The government has to start a bidding process. Mobile operators (presumably foreign-owned) will buy leases and build networks, putting in hundreds of millions of dollars in capital. That's step one.

"Step two is determining and seeing whether, once Cubans actually go online, are they allowed free expression?" he says, "Or is the Internet more like it is in Iran?"

It's a hot question — though interestingly, it's also somewhat peripheral. In plenty of countries, Ross says, government control has a chilling effect on online speech. But as seen during the Arab Spring, if a wireless signal is there, citizens will use it.

Role of U.S. Tech Companies

U.S. tech companies like Google, Facebook and CISCO are watching how commercial policy shapes up.

Kenth Engo-Monsen with the European telecom operator Telenor says these companies can play a huge role in keeping the Internet free: If and when a government asks for a secret surveillance deal, they can say no.

"That's not part of being a mobile operator," he says, "because you have your relationship with your customers, and that is built on the trust that you have with them."

Engo-Monsen says that he's happy for Cuba, and that he views the Internet as a human right.

Nathan Eagle, a mobile technology analyst with Jana, says companies are going to compete fiercely to get the Cuba telecom contract, and that will help Cubans.

"Once third-party mobile carriers come in, they bring tariff plans — they price connectivity in a competitive way" so the average Cuban can afford service, he says.

digital divide

internet access

Raul Castro

Cuba

It took a few hours for some Cubans to realize the magnitude of President Obama's announcement on Wednesday about changes in the relationship between the U.S. and Cuba, according to Cuban blogger Yoani Snchez.

Why? Because they were at the market, buying fish. "It is important to also say that the news had fierce competition, like the arrival of fish to the rationed market, after years of disappearance," wrote Sanchez, who is perhaps the most celebrated dissident on the island.

As you've probably heard — or seen, if you've traveled to Cuba — food (and, at times, the lack thereof) remains one of the most striking emblems of Cuba's dysfunctional economic system. Let's just say that the agreement between Obama and Cuban President Raul Castro will probably eventually mean big changes for the food supply in Cuba.

But if you're picturing Cubans sipping Frappuccinos at Starbucks in Havana, or a Carnival cruise ship full of American tourists unloading in the port and filing into a gleaming new McDonald's, hold your horses. Such massive changes are, in theory, more possible than they were on Tuesday, but not before our two governments work out a huge number of issues embedded in our super complex trade relationship, analysts say.

Obama and Castro's speeches were significant and expansive, says John Kavulich, president of the U.S.-Cuba Trade and Economic Council, but "the details are what matter. What people tend to forget is it's not what the U.S. wants to do to or for Cuba. It's about what Cuba feels is in its interest."

Most Cubans depend on monthly rations (limited amounts of deeply subsidized food) of rice, beans, coffee and a few other staple foods for their sustenance. There's also a thriving black market for food, supplying the wealthy and the foreigners with gourmet items like blue cheese and smoked salmon smuggled in by suitcase. (I traveled to Cuba in 2003 and 2007, first on a person-to-person license and then on a freelance journalist visa. Like so many other American visitors, I was utterly bewitched by the people, the music, the rum. But I lost weight there — probably because candy bars and other snacks were so hard to come by.)

Of course, Cuba is far more food secure than many of its similarly impoverished neighbors in Latin America like Honduras and Haiti. But animal (and fish) protein is in extremely limited supply, and to buy food, Cubans have to wrestle with a "jigsaw puzzle" — different markets and currencies for different food products.

Cuba imports about 80 percent of its food, which costs the government $2 billion a year. Since 2000, a solid chunk of that has come from the U.S. In 2013, American firms sold $348 million worth of agricultural goods to Cuba, according to the U.S.-Cuba Trade and Economic Council. The top three products? Frozen chicken, soybean meal (for animal feed) and corn.

Wednesday's announcement was not the end of the embargo, of course. But Obama's new approach to Cuba includes "expanded sales and exports of certain goods and services from the U.S. to Cuba." That includes agricultural products, from commodities like rice and beans to butter.

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Banana growers at a market on the outskirts of Havana, Cuba, on Sept. 30, 2013. Cuba currently imports few fruits and vegetables from the U.S., but the American Farm Bureau says the change in relations may allow for new trade opportunities. Ramon Espinosa/AP hide caption

itoggle caption Ramon Espinosa/AP

Banana growers at a market on the outskirts of Havana, Cuba, on Sept. 30, 2013. Cuba currently imports few fruits and vegetables from the U.S., but the American Farm Bureau says the change in relations may allow for new trade opportunities.

Ramon Espinosa/AP

And for U.S. agricultural producers, the most important part of Wednesday's announcement was Obama's call to lift restrictions on financial transactions for food products, says David Salmonsen, a trade specialist with the American Farm Bureau.

Currently, any agricultural producer who wants to sell to Cuba has to get cash upfront from the Cuban government before shipping, and the money exchange must be handled through a third-party bank, which means all kinds of extra transaction costs.

If the Treasury Department and Commerce Department go along with Obama's order, then those producers will now be able to do business more directly with the Cuban government and its banks, says Salmonsen.

Without those extra transaction costs, certain U.S. producers that don't currently sell to Cuba — like fruit and vegetables producers — may finally be able to offer the Cuban government a competitive price. Or rice from the Southeast U.S.: Cuba used to buy it, until we were out-competed by Brazil and Vietnam.

Cargill, for one, says it's optimistic about the opportunities. So is the American Soybean Association.

"Depending on how it develops, it could put our producers back into a more normal trading relationship with Cuba, so that the whole supply chain evolves, and demand rises as barriers are reduced and eliminated," says Salmonsen.

But as Kavulich points out, food isn't necessarily Cuba's biggest priority: Investments in infrastructure may be more desperately needed.

Still, "there are opportunities" for food companies, he says, but what happens when the "Cubans say, 'That's all well and good, but we need help with financing?' The risk of doing business with the Cuban government is huge."

Cuba's government has considerable trade deficits with other nations, but little with the U.S. If American businesses want to sell more to Cuba, they might find themselves waiting a while to get paid, he says.

The big trade picture aside, the outlook for Cuban cuisine is also a bit murky. As I reported in 2012, Cuban chefs haven't been able to incorporate many modern cooking techniques, or exotic ingredients. (I don't think sous vides machines can get past the embargo.) So chefs may have to wait a while before they can import some of the American ingredients they covet.

As Sanchez wrote, Wednesday's announcement "is just the beginning." It's tempting to get excited about the future of Cuban food, but "keep the corks in the bottles," she says.

cuban food

Among the changes to U.S. restrictions on Cuba President Obama announced Wednesday was a relaxation of the rules barring U.S. banks from doing business there.

Americans traveling in Cuba will now be able to use their credit cards and ATM cards, but many U.S. banks see the new rules as something of a legal minefield.

Even before Wednesday's announcement, the trade embargo with Cuba wasn't absolute. The government allowed U.S. citizens to sell certain kinds of agricultural and medical products to Cuba under special license, but many companies were reluctant to do so.

The government has long barred U.S. banks from doing business in Cuba, meaning anyone hoping to sell products there had to find an intermediary bank in Cuba to process the trade. It's a complicated process, and Julia Sweig of the Council on Foreign Relations says a lot of banks decided it wasn't worth the trouble.

"Cuba has to tie itself in knots in order to find financial or business institutions that are willing to pay the additional markup to do business with it," she says.

The new rules will allow U.S. banks to form direct relationships with banks in Cuba. They will also make the process of paying for goods traded with the country a lot easier.

"So these changes are potentially seismic in that they would make a lot simpler, a lot more direct and a lot cheaper, all of these financial transactions," says Ted Henken, a professor at Baruch College and author of Entrepreneurial Cuba: The Changing Policy Landscape.

And yet, many banks are looking at these changes with caution.

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5 Defining Moments In The U.S.-Cuba Relationship

The U.S. has trade embargos against several countries including Iran and North Korea, and in recent years the U.S. government has pursued banks that violate them aggressively. In July, the French bank BNP Paribas agreed to pay a $9 billion fine for processing transactions for clients in several embargoed countries including Cuba.

The Two-Way

Polls Show Cuban-American Views On U.S.-Cuba Relations Are Nuanced

"In general, banks have been shaken very deeply by recent enforcement actions and are disinclined to dip their feet into what they see as shark-infested waters," says Clif Burns, an attorney who specializes in sanctions.

Right now many U.S. banks are waiting to see the text of the new regulations, says David Schwartz, president and CEO of the Florida International Bankers Association.

"Banks are going to analyze very closely the regulations that do come out to determine how much leeway that does give them, how does that reduce the risk of doing that business?" he says.

But Schwartz also acknowledges that the relaxation of the Cuban embargo is an opportunity for banks, even if they're cautious about taking advantage of it.

banking

Cuba