Marcel Barrena was born in Barcelona in 1981. He is a film director, screenwriter, producer, and editor whose work moves between fiction and documentary, with a strong focus on character driven storytelling and emotional realism.
He made his feature debut with "Cuatro Estaciones" in 2010, a low budget romantic comedy that achieved notable success both on television and online. The film marked a significant milestone in his career, earning him the Gaudí Award for Best TV Movie of the Year and making him the first director to win Gaudí Awards for two different films. "Cuatro Estaciones" was also the first Spanish TV movie selected to represent Spain at the CinemaSpagna Festival in Rome, and it received multiple awards at the Festival de Alicante, including Best Film, Best Director, and the FIPRESCI Award.
Barrena’s second feature, the documentary "Little World (Món Petit)", brought him international recognition. The film won the Doc U Award at IDFA, one of the world’s most important documentary film festivals, and became the first Spanish film to place third in the IDFA Audience Award among more than 300 documentaries. It was later described by Neil Young of The Hollywood Reporter as one of the ten best films of the year. "Little World" went on to win Best Documentary at the Boulder International Film Festival, the Audience Award at the Norwegian Documentary Film Festival, and the Young Jury Award at ZagrebDox. It also received the Gaudí Award for Best Documentary and a nomination for the Goya Awards.
Following its international festival run, *Little World* was released commercially in Spain in 2013 and became the most successful Spanish documentary of the year in terms of both box office performance and awards.
