BY Kara Headley
Cannes 2021 Women Directors: Meet Teodora Ana Mihai – “La Civil”
Teodora Ana Mihai was born in Bucharest, Romania, during the Ceausescu Regime and moved to Belgium in 1989 with her parents. She went to film school in New York. She started working in Belgium as a...
Cannes 2021 Women Directors: Meet Anita Rocha da Silveira – “Medusa”
Born and raised in Rio de Janeiro, Anita Rocha da Silveira has written, directed, and edited three short films: “The Noon Vampire,” “Handball,” and “The Living...
Reclaim Your Story: Crowdfunding Picks
Few things are as frustrating as having your voice drowned out by someone who has not lived your experience. Oppression relies on suppressing minority voices. If you cannot share your stories, your...
Ladies Who Rock: VOD, Webseries, and Podcast Picks
Music is an avenue for letting the unspoken be sung out loud, for sharing with the world the emotions that stir within us. Great music can reach an audience anywhere, relating differently to each...
Tribeca 2021 Directors: Meet Giselle Bailey and Nneka Onuorah – “The Legend of the Underground”
Giselle Bailey is a producer working across TV and commercial production. Her career started in contemporary art where she worked on public performance pieces aimed to disrupt reality. She went on to...
Tribeca 2021 Women Directors: Meet Bernadette Wegenstein – “The Conductor”
Bernadette Wegenstein is an Austrian-born linguist, author, and documentary filmmaker living in Baltimore. She is a professor at Johns Hopkins University. Her films and books bring together her...
Tribeca 2021 Women Directors: Meet Macha Colón – “Perfume de Gardenias”
Macha Colón is Gisela Rosario Ramos, an undisciplined artist currently based in Puerto Rico. Her award-winning short documentary “El Hijo de Ruby” has been shown in international...
Tribeca 2021 Women Directors: Meet Maya Cueva and Leah Galant – “On the Divide”
Maya Cueva is a Latina award-winning director and producer with a background in radio and podcast producing. Her short documentary “The Provider” premiered at SXSW and was nominated for...
Tribeca 2021 Women Directors: Meet Andrea Nix Fine- “LFG”
Andrea Nix Fine is an Oscar, Emmy, and Peabody award-winning filmmaker. In 2021, she, along with her husband and partner Sean Fine, launched impact studio Change Content to develop true stories into...
Tribeca 2021 Women Directors: Meet Shannon Post – “Building a Bridge”
Shannon Post is a queer documentary filmmaker from Florida. She attended college in Orlando, and Pulse nightclub was a safe place for her and her friends to have fun and be out and proud. Her first...
Tribeca 2021 Women Directors: Meet Suzanne Joe Kai – “Like a Rolling Stone: The Life & Times of Ben Fong-Torres”
Suzanne Joe Kai received two Emmy Award nominations and was named Best Woman News Reporter while a broadcast journalist at San Francisco’s NBC affiliate KRON-TV. She worked at KCBS Radio (CBS) and...
Tribeca 2021 Women Directors: Meet Gaysorn Thavat – “The Justice of Bunny King”
Gaysorn Thavat began her film career in 1995 working in the camera department. Starting as a clapper loader, she worked her way up to 1st AC before making the switch to directing with television...
Tribeca 2021 Women Directors: Meet Amber Sealey – “No Man of God”
Amber Sealey is an award-winning filmmaker. She is attached to direct “The Education of Shelby Knox” and a comedy pilot she wrote called “Sistered.” She has written scripts...
Have Pride: Crowdfunding Picks
Being able to relate to and see ourselves in the characters from our favorite films is not a privilege everyone can enjoy. For a long time, authentic LGBTQ+ stories were not being told in meaningful...
Women’s Secret Histories: Crowdfunding Picks
One of the best ways to learn about the world and its many peoples is by listening to stories. When underrepresented groups are given the chance to share — and to be heard — it can...
Human Rights Watch Film Fest 2021 Women Directors: Meet Brooke Swaney – “Daughter of a Lost Bird”
“Daughter of a Lost Bird” is Brooke Swaney’s first feature documentary. She recently made the Blacklist’s Inaugural Indigenous List with “Tinder On The Rez” along with...
Hot Docs 2021 Women Directors: Meet Chris J. Russo – “Lady Buds”
Chris J. Russo’s award-winning short films have screened all over the world, including at the Sundance Film Festival, and have been broadcast on Showtime, PBS, IFC, LOGO, and Netflix. She is a...
Hot Docs 2021 Women Directors: Meet Bobbi Jo Hart – “Fanny: The Right to Rock”
Bobbi Jo Hart is an award-winning American/Canadian documentary filmmaker with Adobe Productions International, based in Montreal. Her most recent feature documentary, “I Am Not a Rock...
Hot Docs 2021 Women Directors: Meet Ann Shin – “A.rtificial I.mmortality”
Ann Shin is an award-winning writer and filmmaker. Her debut novel, “The Last Exiles,” was published earlier this year by Harper Collins. The book is partly based on her experience...
Hot Docs 2021 Women Directors: Meet Mia Halme – “People We Come Across”
Director and writer Mia Halme has a background in journalism. Her documentaries have been screened in various festivals around the world. “Forever Yours” (2012) was awarded the...
Hot Docs 2021 Women Directors: Meet Jessica Beshir – “Faya Dayi”
Jessica Beshir is a Mexican-Ethiopian director, producer, and cinematographer based in Brooklyn, New York. She made her directorial debut with her short film “Hairat,” which premiered at...
Hot Docs 2021 Women Directors: Meet Sheona McDonald – “Dead Man’s Switch: a crypto mystery”
Sheona McDonald is an an award-winning filmmaker who worked in the Canadian film and television industry as a writer, producer, and director for over two decades. Her recent films include “Into...
Hot Docs 2021 Women Directors: Meet Jennifer Redfearn – “Apart”
Jennifer Redfearn is an Academy Award-nominated director. She directed and produced “Sun Come Up” about a small island community losing their land to rising seas. “Sun Come...
Hot Docs 2021 Women Directors: Meet Margaret Byrne – “Any Given Day”
Margaret Byrne is an award-winning filmmaker. She directed and produced “Raising Bertie,” a feature documentary following the lives of three African American boys growing up in rural...
Hot Docs 2021 Women Directors: Meet Louise Detlefsen – “It Is Not Over Yet”
Louise Detlefsen’s latest documentary feature film, “Fat Front,” had its international premiere at IDFA 2019. Her films have been shown on both television and at festivals all over...
Hot Docs 2021 Women Directors: Meet Chloe Fairweather – “Dying to Divorce”
Chloe Fairweather is an award-winning director who specializes in observational documentary and the telling of complex true stories. The Welsh-born filmmaker started out in TV production over 10...
Hot Docs 2021 Women Directors: Meet Caitlin Durlak – “Dropstones”
Caitlin Durlak is an award-winning Canadian filmmaker whose non-fiction work has spanned media such as web series, short film, feature film, and VR storytelling. Her short film “Persistence of...
How to Be a Woman: VOD Picks
There is not one, singular way to be a woman, but looking at the ways women are represented in mainstream media, one may start to believe that’s the case. All too often, the “ideal”...
Losing and Finding Yourself: Crowdfunding Picks
Sometimes, to learn who you are, you have to lose something. This can be a painful process or a joyful one, depending on what you have lost. The important thing is that, through this process, you...
Cinematographer to Watch: Eunsoo Cho of “August at Akiko’s,” “I Was a Simple Man,” & “Victim(s)”
Capturing physical and emotional beauty is one of the many jobs of a cinematographer. This is a skill Eunsoo Cho has developed throughout her years in the industry. She was born and raised in Korea,...
SXSW 2021 Women Directors: Meet Sonia Kennebeck – “United States vs. Reality Winner”
Sonia Kennebeck is a Malaysian-born, New York City-based independent filmmaker and investigative journalist with 17 years of directing and producing experience. Her most recent documentary thriller,...
SXSW 2021 Women Directors: Meet Mallory Everton – “Recovery”
Mallory Everton is best known for being one of the original writer-actors on the sketch comedy show “Studio C” and for her role in the Purple Mattress Raw Egg Test commercial. She also...
SXSW 2021 Women Directors: Meet Ursula Macfarlane – “The Lost Sons”
Emmy and BAFTA-nominated director Ursula Macfarlane is known for making films which combine the epic with the intimate, often focusing on marginalized communities or victims of trauma. Her feature...
SXSW 2021 Women Directors: Meet Lissette Feliciano – “Women is Losers”
Lissette Feliciano is a writer, director, producer, and a graduate of Tisch School of the Arts. She is a Tribeca Film Institute AT&T Untold Stories grant recipient, was named as one of Shoot...
SXSW 2021 Women Directors: Meet Mari Walker – “See You Then”
Mari Walker is an award-winning director, writer, and editor. Films she has worked on have been screened at numerous film festivals including Sundance, SXSW, Frameline, and Outfest. Walker’s...
SXSW 2021 Women Directors: Meet Leah Purcell – “The Drover’s Wife: The Legend of Molly Johnson”
Leah Purcell is a proud Goa-Gungarri-Wakka Wakka Murri woman from Queensland, Australia. She is an internationally acclaimed playwright, screenwriter, director, novelist, actor, cultural icon, and...
SXSW 2021 Women Directors: Meet Hannaleena Hauru – “Fucking with Nobody”
Hannaleena Hauru is a Finnish screenwriter and director. Her debut feature, “Thick Lashes of Lauri Mäntyvaara” (2016), was developed at Torino Film Lab and Cannes Cinéfondation...
SXSW 2021 Women Directors: Meet Andrea Nevins – “Hysterical”
Andrea Blaugrund Nevins is an Academy Award-nominated, Emmy-winning director, producer, and writer. Her credits include “Still Kicking,” “The Other F Word,” “Play It...
SXSW 2021 Women Directors: Meet Stacey Gregg – “Here Before”
Stacey Gregg is a Belfast and London based writer, director, and performer working across film, TV, and theater. She is currently developing several original television drama series including...
SXSW 2021 Women Directors: Meet Caroline Catz – “Delia Derbyshire: The Myths and the Legendary Tapes”
A British actor who has worked extensively in television, theater, film, and radio, Caroline Catz is also an accomplished film director and writer. Catz’s films include “A Message to the...
The Act of Healing: Crowdfunding Picks
The act of healing takes many forms. From the healing of a physical trauma, to the healing that takes place within our hearts and minds, to the healing of a system — the work is never done....
Cinematographer to Watch: Nanu Segal of “Marvelous and the Black Hole” & “An Evening with Beverly Luff Linn”
Well-crafted films can grab you by the shoulders and sink you into a new reality, a skill cinematographer Nanu Segal has mastered through her years in the business. Segal has an impressive resume of...
The Definition of Self: VOD Picks
How do we define ourselves? Do we look at the fragmented bits and pieces of our identities, or do we look at the whole? Are we defined by our families, our names, our passions? Can we be defined at...
Sundance 2021 Women Directors: Meet Debbie Lum – “Try Harder!”
Debbie Lum is an award-winning filmmaker whose projects give voice to the Asian American experience and other unsung stories. “Seeking Asian Female,” her feature-length directing debut,...
Sundance 2021 Women Directors: Meet Parker Hill and Isabel Bethencourt – “Cusp”
Parker Hill’s thesis film, “One Good Pitch,” premiered at the 2016 Tribeca Film Festival. Her short films “Homing In” and “Sanderson to Brackettville” have...
Sundance 2021 Women Directors: Meet Natalia Almada – “Users”
Natalia Almada is the recipient of the 2012 MacArthur Genius Award. Her directing credits include “Al Otro Lado” (2005 Tribeca Film Festival), “El General” (2009 Sundance Film...
Sundance 2021 Women Directors: Meet Betsy West and Julie Cohen – “My Name is Pauli Murray”
Betsy West is the Academy Award-nominated director and producer of “RBG” along with Julie Cohen. She is a 21-time Emmy Award winner for her work as an ABC News producer and executive...
Sundance 2021 Women Directors: Meet Rintu Thomas – “Writing with Fire”
Rintu Thomas is an independent documentary director-producer based in New Delhi, India. She is a 2018 Sundance Institute, Bertha Foundation Fellow, and a 2019 Sundance Stories of Change Fellow. A...
Sundance 2021 Women Directors: Meet Jamila Wignot – “Ailey”
Jamila Wignot is a documentary filmmaker whose directing work includes the Peabody, Emmy, and NAACP award-winning series “The African-Americans: Many Rivers to Cross” (PBS), hosted by...
Sundance 2021 Women Directors: Meet Maisie Crow – “At the Ready”
Maisie Crow is a documentary film director, cinematographer, and photographer. “Jackson,” Crow’s documentary exploring both sides of the reproductive health care debate in the Deep...
Sundance 2021 Women Directors: Meet Karen Cinorre – “Mayday”
Karen Cinorre is a writer/director whose work has shown internationally at such venues as the New York Film Festival, Rotterdam Film Festival, and Opera Centrum Amsterdam. She’s currently...