-
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 Read more
-
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 Read more
-
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 Read more
-
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 Read more
-
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 Read more
-
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 Read more
SCREEN CUBA, 15-28 March 2026, LONDON & BEYOND 