cubafilmfest
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2026 Festival Poster revealed
We are thrilled to unveil our brilliant 2026 Festival poster, created by two young outstanding graphic designers based in Cuba. Roberto Pérez Curbelo (@_potto_), who designed last year’s poster, has now teamed up with Dayron Giro (@d.giro.design) to produce a colourful and captivating image that we’re confident you’ll enjoy as much as we do. Puro…
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Adela Legrá and Lucía
Adela Legrá, who died on 2 January 2026, was an iconic figure in Cuban cinema and one of the most celebrated actors on the island’s film and television screens. Lucía was the film that brought her to the attention of audiences in Cuba—and far beyond—and Screen Cuba audiences will be delighted to see it will…
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Lucía and the search for decolonization
Read here about the director Humberto Solas’s ideas when interviewed at the time his film Lucia was made in Cuba. “In a general sense, globally, Lucía is a film of quests. […] There are several points that identify these stories: the presence of women, the attitude of women in certain eras, and their relationship with…
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Lucía, a standout film of the festival
There’s not long to go until we reveal the brilliant programme for this year’s festival. In themeantime, to whet your appetite, we’re delighted to offer a glimpse of one of the highlights in store:Lucía (1968), directed by Humberto Solás.One of the most emblematic works in the history of Cuban cinema, Lucía promises to be a…
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The preservation of Cuba’s film archives is an urgent race against time
OVER THE last year more than 15,000 children and teenagers have crowded into Cuban cinemas to see animations featuring Elpidio Valdés, restored with the help of funds raised by the Screen Cuba film festival. Elpidio is a cartoon character created for children in the 1970s by Juan Padrón, who symbolises the fight for Cuban independence…
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Cinema to the rescue
When Screen Cuba donated funds for the recently restored Clarín Mambí, an early cartoon by Cuba’s godfather of animation Juan Padrón, we could not imagine that the premiere of the restored film would be screened on a bed sheet hung up at an evacuation centre. Yet this is how the José Maceo Vocational School in…
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Screen Cuba Festival 2025 helps restore short films by Juan Padrón
Screen Cuban has done it again! The Festival has recently paid £6,700 to the Colombian Film Heritage Foundation as requested by the Cuban Film Institute (ICAIC), to support ICAIC’s project to restore many of its important classic films in its archive. Last year we donated £3000, enabling the restoration of two early cartoons about Elpidio…
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Music Fund for Cuba donates supplies for Cuban film makers
Boxes of much needed materials for the Cuban Film Institute are on their way to Havana. They have been donated by one of Screen Cuba’s sponsors, The Music Fund for Cuba. The charity responded to an appeal by ICAIC’s restoration archive team for specific items which are impossible to source in Cuba thanks to the…
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Film by Cuban children came to Britain
Several hundred children greeted the Cuban short Una Aventura de Elpido Valdés by Juan Padrón with plenty of laughs about its slapstick jokes and humorous escapades when it was screened at the Children’s International Film Festival @childrensfilmfestival in Kingston, UK in June. This 1974 animation about a popular anti-colonial hero, loved by Cuban children, was…
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Cuban Film Institute recognises Screen Cuba
Screen Cuba has received a special award from the Cuban Film Institute (ICAIC) and we are delighted to receive it. In presenting the award to Screen Cuba coordinators Trish Meehan and Dodie Weppler in recognition of the Festival’s success in the past two years, Cuban Ambassador Ismara Vargas Walter explained how the Festival played a…
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Screen Cuba wraps up for 2025 – “together we can do amazing things”
After screening another selection of incredible films from Cuba in London and beyond, the 2025 festival is over! We are delighted that we have had such positive feedback about the programme, and increased our audience by more than a third over last year in London alone. It once again confirms our view that UK audiences…
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Padrón book captures “the identity of an entire people”
This year Screen Cuba will give a special place to the work of Cuban director Juan Padrón (1947-2020), the island’s revered godfather of animation. Not only are we screening two of his first animations, we are welcoming his daughter Silvia Padrón, who is working to preserve his legacy, and we are also making available for…
SCREEN CUBA, 15-28 March 2026, LONDON & BEYOND 