BY Meghan Gheron
Jiayan “Jenny” Shi on Deviating from Traditional True Crime Docs with “Finding Yingying”
Jiayan “Jenny” Shi is a documentary filmmaker and video journalist who is passionate about social justice issues regarding people of color. She shoots, edits, and produces video stories...
DOC NYC 2020 Women Directors: Meet Katrine Philp – “Beautiful Something Left Behind”
Katrine Philp’s first film, “Book of Miri,” was awarded the President’s Award at the Full Frame Documentary Film Festival, nominated at IDFA, and won the European Young CIVIS...
Mary Mazzio on “A Most Beautiful Thing,” Her Doc About the First African American High School Rowing Team
Mary Mazzio is a documentary filmmaker, former attorney, and Olympic rower. As a filmmaker, Mazzio explores the concept of overcoming obstacles, whether it is a fight for social change (“A Hero...
Natalie Erika James on Making “Relic,” a Psychological Horror Pic Inspired by Alzheimer’s
Natalie Erika James is a Japanese-Australian writer and director who is based in Melbourne, Australia. James’ 2016 short “Crestwick” premiered at the Melbourne International Film...
Connections and Conversations: Crowdfunding Picks
Remembering the things that connect us and bring us together, as well as committing to honest conversation with each other — even when the topic is difficult — has never been more...
Human Rights Watch Film Fest 2020 Women Directors: Meet Mira Jargil – “Reunited”
Mira Jargil is known for the award-winning festival hit “The Time We Have,” the feature documentary “Dreaming of a Family,” and the series “Till Death Do Us Part.” The...
Human Rights Watch Film Fest 2020 Women Directors: Meet Christina Antonakos-Wallace – “From Here”
Christina Antonakos-Wallace is a filmmaker and cultural organizer. Her short films and interactive work has been exhibited in over a dozen countries, in contexts from schools to festivals galleries...
Human Rights Watch Film Fest 2020 Women Directors: Meet Ursula Liang – “Down a Dark Stairwell”
Ursula Liang is a journalist-turned-filmmaker and producer. Her producing credits include “One October,” “Tough Love,” “Wo Ai Ni Mommy,” “Spartan Ultimate...
Inclusive Perspectives: Crowdfunding Picks
It’s more important than ever to support underrepresented voices and viewpoints in film — whether they focus on fact or fiction. Our latest round of crowdfunding picks each highlight...
Hot Docs 2020 Women Directors: Meet Laura Gabbert – “Ottolenghi and the Cakes of Versailles”
Laura Gabbert feature documentary credits include” “No Impact Man,” “Sunset Story,” and “City of Gold.” In 2017, she was a director on the Netflix show...
Hot Docs 2020 Women Directors: Meet Chris J. Russo – “Lady Buds”
Chris J. Russo is a director whose work aims to give visibility to women in underrepresented communities in order to portray them in the power and equality they deserve. Her award-winning short films...
Hot Docs 2020 Women Directors: Meet Asia Dér and Sári Haragonics – “Her Mothers”
Asia Dér graduated as a documentary director from the DOC Nomads MA program. Her graduation film was nominated for the best short film at the Hungarian Film Festival. She is working on her second...
Hot Docs 2020 Women Directors: Meet Ying Wang – “The World is Bright”
As a migrant navigating between multiple cultures, Ying Wang is fascinated by stories that reveal the geopolitical complexity of global migration. Inspired by her sister’s experiences, Wang wrote...
Hot Docs 2020 Women Directors: Meet Judith Helfand – “Love & Stuff”
Peabody award-winning filmmaker Judith Helfand tackles some of the most pressing issues of our time — from the climate crisis and systemic inequality to love, grief, and the transformative...
Hot Docs 2020 Women Directors: Meet Priscila Padilla – “Breaking the Silence”
Priscila Padilla is a Colombian documentarist and scriptwriter. With over 20 years of experience in the documentary field, her film work has always revolved around women’s issues and stories...
Hot Docs 2020 Women Directors: Meet Jennifer Maytorena Taylor – “For the Love of Rutland”
Jennifer Maytorena Taylor’s work has shown at venues like the Sundance, Los Angeles, San Francisco and Locarno Film Festivals, International Documentary Festival Amsterdam, and the New York...
Hot Docs 2020 Women Directors: Meet Sharon Liese – “Transhood”
Before completing “Pink Collar Crimes,” a true crime series for CBS, Sharon Liese’s short documentary “Fight for the First” premiered at Chuck Todd’s Meet the Press...
Hot Docs 2020 Women Directors: Meet Deepti Gupta – “Shut Up Sona”
Deepti Gupta is a filmmaker and director of photography living in Mumbai, India. An alumna of the Film & TV Institute of India, she has shot many documentaries, narrative feature films, and music...
Hot Docs 2020 Women Directors: Meet Stefanía Thors – “The School of Housewives”
Stefanía Thors is a filmmaker from Reykjavík, Iceland. She studied theater in Prague, and graduated with a masters from the Academy of Performing Arts. While studying, Thors worked as an assistant...
Hot Docs 2020 Women Directors: Meet Maeve O’Boyle, Lucy Kennedy, and Aideen Kane – “The 8th”
Maeve O’Boyle is an Emmy-award winning editor and producer. She edited HBO’s “The Education of Mohammad Hussein,” which was shortlisted for an Academy Award. She co-produced and...
Hot Docs 2020 Women Directors: Meet Diana Neille – “Influence”
Diana Neille is an award-winning journalist and filmmaker from Johannesburg, South Africa. Neille co-founded two media startups with the intention of fostering long-form investigative storytelling...
Hot Docs 2020 Women Directors: Meet Mia Donovan – “Dope is Death”
Mia Donovan is an award-winning filmmaker based in Montreal. She was the recipient of the prestigious Don Haig Award for outstanding achievement as an emerging filmmaker in 2012. Her films have been...
Hot Docs 2020 Women Directors: Meet Maria Finitzo – “The Dilemma of Desire”
Maria Finitzo is a two-time Peabody Award-winning social issue documentary filmmaker. She has been producing and directing documentary films for network television, public broadcasting, cable TV, and...
Hot Docs 2020 Women Directors: Meet Liz Marshall – “Meat the Future”
Liz Marshall is an award-winning Canadian filmmaker. Since the 1990s, she has written, produced, directed, and filmed diverse international and socially conscious documentaries. Marshall’s...
The Road to Romance: Crowdfunding Picks
When it comes to love, things don’t always work out as smoothly as we’d like them to. Our latest round of crowdfunding picks examine the sometimes rocky road to romance in a number of...
Tribeca 2020 Women Directors: Meet Sabrina Doyle – “Lorelei”
Sabrina Doyle is a British writer and director based in Los Angeles and London. The AFI alumna’s directing has been supported by Women in Film LA, the Chimaera Project, Google, Panavision, the...
Tribeca 2020 Women Directors: Meet Michèle Stephenson – “Stateless”
As co-founder of Rada Studio, Michèle Stephenson pulls from her Panamanian and Haitian roots and experience as a human rights attorney to tell provocative stories that speak to personal and systemic...
May 2020 Film Preview
This May offers a wide selection of women-made and centric films of all genres to check out on VOD and streaming platforms. Starting off the month is “The Half of It,” which hits Netflix...
Tribeca 2020 Women Directors: Meet Dea Gjinovci – “Wake Up on Mars”
Dea Gjinovci is a Swiss-Albanian director and producer. She is a 2019 Sundance Talent Forum alum and 2019 Film Independent Fellow. Her award-winning documentary short “Sans le Kosovo”...
Breaking Barriers: Crowdfunding Picks
We all eventually face barriers of some kind. These barriers can be personal or professional, and often concern both ourselves and the families and communities we come from. Our latest crowdfunding...
Tribeca 2020 Women Directors: Meet Jessica Earnshaw – “Jacinta”
Jessica Earnshaw is a documentary photographer and filmmaker whose work focuses on criminal justice and healthcare. In 2015, she received the Rita and Alex Hillman Foundation Fellowship and Grant to...
Family Legacies: Crowdfunding Picks
Family can come with a lot of baggage, good and bad. Our latest crowdfunding picks examine all the complications of our familial relationships — the ones we choose and the ones we don’t...
Responding to Trauma: Crowdfunding Picks
Trauma impacts all of us in different ways, and can come from many different places, whether they be our experiences with gender, race, and class, our family, or our friends. Our latest crowdfunding...
“M for Magic’s” Alexis Manya Spraic on Hollywood’s Magic Castle and Women’s Unacknowledged Work
Filmmaker Alexis Manya Spraic is a fourth-generation Angeleno who is drawn to transformative stories of women and people of color languishing in the footnotes of history and culture. She has dual...
Laughter as Resilience: Crowdfunding Picks
Comedy is an extremely effective — and often underrated — tool by which to tell important stories. Our latest crowdfunding picks use humor to examine a variety of important contemporary...
Challenging the Narrative: Crowdfunding Picks
Sometimes we can feel alienated and left out by the narratives portrayed in culture and media, particularly when they fail to address and include the unique experiences of those with marginalized...
Grandmas, Girlhood, and Growing Up: Crowdfunding Picks
Growing up can be tough — navigating personal identity and self-expression as well as increasingly complicated relationships with family and friends is no easy task, especially when factors...
Sundance 2020 Women Directors: Meet Susanne Regina Meures – “Saudi Runaway”
Susanne Regina Meures is a Swiss-German filmmaker. Her debut film, “Raving Iran,” premiered in 2016 and has been shown at over 130 film festivals worldwide, including Hot Docs and Visions...
Sundance 2020 Women Directors: Meet Ramona S. Diaz – “A Thousand Cuts”
Ramona S. Diaz’s award-winning films include “Imelda,” “The Learning,” “Don’t Stop Believin’: Everyman’s Journey,” and...
Sundance 2020 Women Directors: Meet Kim A. Snyder – “Us Kids”
Kim A. Snyder directed the Peabody Award–winning documentary “Newtown,” which premiered at the 2016 Sundance Film Festival before screening at festivals worldwide, being released...
Sundance 2020 Women Directors: Meet Shana Feste – “Run Sweetheart Run”
Shana Feste’s first feature, “The Greatest,” premiered at Sundance 2009 and went on to be nominated for a Humanitas Prize. Her second writing and directing effort, “Country...
Sundance 2020 Women Directors: Kirsten Johnson – “Dick Johnson Is Dead”
Kirsten Johnson’s most recent film “Cameraperson” premiered at the 2016 Sundance Film Festival and was shortlisted for an Academy Award. Her short “The Above” premiered at...
Sundance 2020 Women Directors: Meet Romola Garai – “Amulet”
Romola Garai is a writer, director, and actor, whose directorial debut, “Scrubber,” was nominated for Sundance Best Short Film in 2013. As a performer, her extensive film, TV, and stage...
Sundance 2020 Women Directors: Tara Miele – “Wander Darkly”
Tara Miele is a writer and director in both film and television. Her directorial work includes the backdoor pilot “Green Arrow and The Canaries,” episodes of “Arrow,”...
Sundance 2020 Women Directors: Ekwa Msangi – “Farewell Amor”
Ekwa Msangi is a Tanzanian-American filmmaker who has written and directed several drama series for mainstream broadcasters in Kenya and South Africa, including “The Agency,” MNET’s...
Sundance 2020 Women Directors: Meet Phyllida Lloyd – “Herself”
Phyllida Lloyd is known for her award-winning work in theater, opera, and film. In 2008, she directed the film version of “Mamma Mia,” which went on to make over $600 million worldwide....
Sundance 2020 Women Directors: Meet Brenda Chapman – “Come Away”
Brenda Chapman began her career at Walt Disney Feature Animation, working on films that include the Academy Award–nominated “Beauty and the Beast” and “The Lion King,” for...
The Roles We Play: Crowdfunding Picks
Figuring out who you are — and who you want to be — can be a difficult process, especially in a world so eager to put limitations on which identities are considered acceptable. This is an...