Cuban filmmaker Manuel Marzel dies in Valencia

July 26, 2025

Manuel Marzel, Cuban filmmaker based in Spain since 1997 and author of a brief but irreplaceable filmography in the 1990s in Cuba, died this Tuesday in Valencia at age 57, victim of a heart attack, according to Diario de Cuba reported by filmmaker José Luis Aparicio. "We are all in shock and devastated," he said.

The news was confirmed on social media by friends and colleagues of the filmmaker. From Facebook, filmmaker Kiki Álvarez expressed: "He was the angel of Cuban cinema's whimsy," and added with regret: "Another one who dies far from Cuba because Cuba became too small for his wings." For his part, editor Ricardo Acosta wrote: "You never resembled others, you have always been true to your beauty, imperishable, contagious."

Marzel was born in Santiago de Cuba on September 2, 1967 and, after moving to Havana, trained as a graphic designer at the Instituto Superior de Diseño Industrial (ISDI). During his time as a student, he joined Cineclub Sigma, where he directed his first three short films, which received recognition and several awards, according to a biography published on the blog lastcrhistmas.

In 1991 he enrolled at the International Film and TV School of San Antonio de los Baños, where he continued his training as a filmmaker. There he directed three more shorts and graduated in the specialty of Film Direction. In an interview published in Rialta Magazine, Marzel recalled his film debut: "I started making films precisely in 1990, and surprisingly my first short (A Norman Mc Laren) was such a great success that they even gave me a Coral award. I was 23 years old and was quite naive."

From 1994 onwards he joined the Cuban Institute of Cinematographic Art and Industry (ICAIC), where he directed a new short film, as well as the promotional spots for two editions of the International Festival of New Latin American Cinema. His incorporation into the ICAIC, Marzel himself recalled, was due to producer and cultural promoter Pepe Horta.

That same year, the Havana Festival screened Marzel… A Spinetta, his first and only feature film produced entirely by the ICAIC. This work, according to Rialta Magazine, became his definitive calling card, consolidating his place within the group of emerging authors of the nineties.

In addition to the aforementioned documentary La ballena es buena (1991), his filmography in Cuba included the short film Chao Sarah (1993), according to the Digital Encyclopedia of Cuban Audiovisual (ENDAC). Marzel also designed several film posters, some in collaboration with designer Eduardo Marín. During that same period he attempted to carry out a new feature film, but his script was censored.

In 1997 he emigrated to Spain and settled in Valencia. There he taught Film Screenwriting workshops in academies, cineclubs and cultural spaces. Additionally, he wrote several feature film scripts and a short novel, published in that city. In 2021, Marzel announced through his social media that he had acquired Spanish citizenship.

Specialized critics highlighted his work as one of the most singular in Cuban audiovisual. "Manuel Marzel is our great Dadaist filmmaker. He is the greatest. It doesn't matter that he's probably the only one," wrote José Luis Aparicio and Katherine Bisquet. "His negation of the rational, his taste for the absurd and his decadent and ironic anarchism (which reaches the point of declaring himself as frivolous) shape a cinema whose only principle is to have no principles. That is why each of his films is so different from the others, although sensory, iconic or tonal connections are established."

Despite his low public profile and limited production, Marzel remained a cult figure within cinephile circles. In recent years, his name was vindicated by new generations of Cuban filmmakers, who consider him a figure ahead of his time.

So far there has been no report of tribute events or wakes, but numerous messages of affection and farewell have multiplied on social media. Marzel leaves a fragmentary but essential legacy for understanding the renewal of Cuban cinema in the nineties, as well as a lesson in authenticity and creative resistance that transcends borders and geographies.