#Festivals
Sundance 2022 Women Directors: Meet Tia Lessin and Emma Pildes – “The Janes”
Tia Lessin was nominated for an Academy Award for her work as a director and producer of the Hurricane Katrina survival story “Trouble the Water,” winner of the 2008 Sundance Grand Jury Prize and...
Sundance 2022 Women Directors: Meet Rachel Lears – “To the End”
Rachel Lears is a documentary director, producer, and cinematographer based in Brooklyn, NY. Rachel’s most recent feature documentary, Netflix’s “Knock Down the House,” won...
Sundance 2022 Women Directors: Meet Isabel Castro – “Mija”
Isabel Castro is a four-time Emmy-nominated, Mexican-American filmmaker who combines a practice in journalism and art to tell stories about immigration, civil rights, and identity. She splits her...
Sundance 2022 Women Directors: Meet Julie Ha – “Free Chol Soo Lee”
Julie Ha’s storytelling career spans more than two decades, with a specialized focus on Asian American stories. She worked as an editor for 10 years at KoreAm Journal, a national Korean American...
Sundance 2022 Women Directors: Meet Sara Dosa -“Fire of Love”
Sara Dosa is an Indie Spirit Award-nominated documentary director and Peabody award-winning producer. Her first feature as a director, “The Last Season,” won a Golden Gate Award at its...
Sundance 2022 Women Directors: Meet Amy Poehler – “Lucy and Desi”
Perhaps best known for her Emmy-nominated series “Parks and Recreation,” Amy Poehler currently serves as co-creator, executive producer, and the lead voice of Fox’s animated series...
Sundance 2022 Women Directors: Meet Ondi Timoner – “Last Flight Home”
Ondi Timoner is an internationally-acclaimed filmmaker who has the rare distinction of winning the Grand Jury Prize at Sundance twice – for “Dig!” (2004), about the collision of art and...
Sundance 2022 Women Directors: Meet Rita Baghdadi – “Sirens”
Rita Baghdadi is an award-winning Moroccan-American documentary filmmaker whose work has been supported by Sundance, Tribeca, Netflix, HBO, Film Independent, and the International Documentary...
Sundance 2022 Women Directors: Meet Tania Anderson– “The Mission”
Tania Anderson is a British, American, and Swiss filmmaker based in Helsinki, Finland. She has worked as a writer and journalist, most recently as a writer for National Geographic, where she...
Sundance 2022 Women Directors: Meet Snow Hnin Ei Hlaing – “Midwives”
Snow Hnin Ei Hlaing has worked as a freelance filmmaker in Myanmar since 2006, acting as director, producer, editor, and sound recordist. Her short “Burmese Butterfly” played festivals in...
Sundance 2022 Women Directors: Meet Maria Loohufvud – “Calendar Girls”
Maria Loohufvud is an art director with a background in music and dance. Her feminist engagement has led to projects on many platforms, such as the equality game Komma Lika. Together with Love...
Sundance 2022 Women Directors: Meet Monia Chokri – “Babysitter”
Monia Chokri is a Canadian stage and television actor, as well as an award-winning director. Her first feature film, ”A Brother’s Love,” won the Un Certain Regard jury’s Coup de Coeur at the...
Sundance 2022 Women Directors: Meet Martika Ramirez Escobar – “Leonor Will Never Die”
Martika Ramirez Escobar is a filmmaker-cinematographer based in Manila. Her thesis film from the University of the Philippines competed at the 19th Busan International Film Festival. Her latest work,...
Sundance 2022 Women Directors: Meet Mariama Diallo – “Master”
Mariama Diallo is a Brooklyn based writer-director. Her short film “Hair Wolf” premiered at the 2018 Sundance Film Festival, where it won The Short Film Jury Award: U.S. Fiction....
Sundance 2022 Women Directors: Meet Krystin Ver Linden – “Alice”
Krystin Ver Linden is a director and screenwriter. Her script “Ride” sold to Lionsgate with Jill Solloway attached to direct. Her pitch “Love in Vain,” an unconventional...
Sundance 2022 Women Directors: Meet Francisca Alegría – “The Cow Who Sang a Song Into the Future”
Francisca Alegría is Chilean filmmaker whose short film “And the Whole Sky Fit in the Dead Cow’s Eye” received the award for Best International Fiction Short Film at the 2017...
Sundance 2022 Women Directors: Meet Chloe Okuno – “Watcher”
Chloe Okuno is a writer-director based in Los Angeles. Her recent work includes writing a remake of “Audrey Rose” for Orion Pictures and writing and directing a segment of the anthology series...
Sundance 2022 Women Directors: Meet Audrey Diwan – “Happening”
Audrey Diwan is a filmmaker, author, and screenwriter who has collaborated with Valérie Donzelli, Cédric Jimenez, and Gilles Lellouche among others. She made her feature film directing debut with...
Sundance 2022 Women Directors: Meet Adamma Ebo – “Honk for Jesus. Save Your Soul.”
Adamma Ebo is a Nigerian-American writer, director, and producer who works alongside her identical twin, Adanne Ebo. Both wrote on “Mrs. & Mrs. Smith,” an upcoming Amazon series. They...
Sundance 2022 Women Directors: Meet Violet Columbus – “The Exiles”
Violet Columbus is a writer-director currently living in New York City. She graduated from NYU’s Tisch School Of The Arts in 2016. “The Exiles” is her debut feature film. “The Exiles...
Sundance 2022 Women Directors: Meet Alli Haapasalo – “Girl Picture”
Alli Haapasalo is a Finnish director and writer with passion for telling strong female-driven stories. Haapasalo’s feature debut, 2016’s “Love and Fury,” followed a writer finding...
Sundance 2022 Women Directors: Meet Carlota Pereda – “Piggy”
Carlota Pereda is a film and series director from Madrid. Pereda started her career in television and was nominated for the Television Academy’s Iris Award for “Águila Roja”...
Sundance 2022 Preview: A Racist History Haunts a College, Activists Fight for the Right to Choose, & More
COVID-19 isn’t putting the brakes on Sundance 2022. The fest has gone digital once again this year due to the pandemic, but we’re thankful the show will go on — online, where...
Black Directors Helm Just 1% of Competition Films at Major Fests, According to New Research
Screen International is offering a brutal reminder of just how far the film industry has yet to go on the road toward inclusivity. The film mag and blog surveyed the main international competitions...
DOC NYC 2021 Women Directors: Meet Trish Adlesic – “A Tree of Life”
Trish Adlesic is an Oscar-nominated and Emmy-winning producer/director. Her producing credits include “Gasland” and “Gasland Part II.” She co-directed and co-produced “I...
DOC NYC 2021 Women Directors: Meet Cathryne Czubek – “Once Upon a Time in Uganda”
Cathryne Czubek is a director and producer based in New York City. “Screw You Cancer,” her award-winning doc series for Condé Nast Entertainment, was the first digital series to receive...
DOC NYC 2021 Women Directors: Meet Diane Tsai – “Be Our Guest”
Diane Tsai is a Taiwanese-American documentary filmmaker and journalist at TIME. Her award-winning documentary series “Firsts,” which she directed and produced with Spencer Bakalar,...
DOC NYC 2021 Women Directors: Meet Geeta Gandbhir and Samantha Knowles – “Black and Missing”
Geeta Gandbhir is an Emmy and Peabody award-winning director, producer, and editor. Her most recent film, “Apart,” co-directed with Rudy Valdez, is currently playing on HBO Max and her...
DOC NYC 2021 Women Directors: Meet Nahid Persson – “Be My Voice”
Nahid Persson is an award-winning documentary filmmaker based in Sweden. She was born in Iran and took political asylum in Sweden as a result of her political activism during and after the 1979...
DOC NYC 2021 Women Directors: Meet Sonja Sohn – “The Slow Hustle”
Sonja Sohn is an actress and filmmaker. Her on-screen credits include “The Wire,” “Body of Proof,” and “The Chi.” She made her directorial debut with the 2017...
DOC NYC 2021 Women Directors: Meet Sara Terry – “A Decent Home”
Sara Terry is a documentary filmmaker. Her first documentary “Fambul Tok,” about an unprecedented grassroots forgiveness program in Sierra Leone, was supported by Sundance and Chicken and...
DOC NYC 2021 Women Directors: Meet Constance Marks – “Grandpa Was an Emperor”
Constance Marks is a director, producer, and award-winning independent documentary filmmaker. She is the founder and president of Constance Marks Productions, Inc., a documentary production company...
DOC NYC 2021 Women Directors: Meet Julia Bacha – “Boycott”
Julia Bacha is a Peabody award-winning filmmaker and the Creative Director at Just Vision. She started her filmmaking career in Cairo, where she wrote and edited “Control Room,” for which...
DOC NYC 2021 Women Directors: Meet Maria Speth – “Mr. Bachmann and His Class”
Maria Speth is a writer, director, and producer of feature films and documentaries. Her debut feature “The Days Between” premiered at the Rotterdam International Film Festival in 2001,...
DOC NYC 2021 Women Directors: Meet Nira Burstein – “Charm Circle”
Nira Burstein is an emerging director based in New York City and was recently selected for Filmmaker Magazine’s 25 New Faces of Independent Film. Burstein is an Independent Film Project (now The...
DOC NYC 2021 Women Directors: Meet Emily Kuester – “Messwood”
Emily Kuester is a director, producer, and writer. She got her start at 371 Productions and has assisted in producing short and long form documentaries, virtual reality experiences (2019 Sundance VR...
DOC NYC 2021 Women Directors: Meet Alysa Nahmias – “Krimes”
Alysa Nahmias is an award-winning filmmaker and founder of the Los Angeles-based production company AJNA. Her work has been shown at festivals and exhibitions worldwide, including the Venice...
DOC NYC 2021 Women Directors: Meet Neasa Ní Chianáín – “Young Plato”
Neasa Ní Chianáin is a documentary filmmaker whose credits include “Frank Ned & Busy Lizzie,” “Fairytale of Kathmandu,” and “The Stranger,” which screened at...
DOC NYC 2021 Women Directors: Meet Abby Epstein – “The Business of Birth Control”
Abby Epstein started her career as a theater director having her own Chicago-based production company, Roadworks Productions, which was founded in 1992. After directing a few productions in Chicago,...
DOC NYC 2021 Women Directors: Meet Erin Bernhardt and Din Blankenship – “Refuge”
Erin Bernhardt is an independent filmmaker. She has won two Peabody Awards, an Emmy, and numerous film festival awards. Her first independent feature documentary, “Imba Means Sing,” aired...
DOC NYC 2021 Women Directors: Meet Holly Morris – “Exposure”
For two decades Holly Morris has told, and championed, pro-woman, cross-cultural stories on the global stage. She is an internationally known filmmaker, author, and presenter. Her last feature film,...
DOC NYC 2021 Women Directors: Meet Sandra Alvarez – “InHospitable”
Sandra Alvarez has spent her career directing and producing a wide spectrum of documentary and television programs for CNN, Netflix, Sundance Channel, History Channel, BBC America, A&E Network,...
DOC NYC 2021 Women Directors: Meet Yasmin C. Rams – “Go Heal Yourself”
Yasmin C. Rams’ credits include the mid-length documentary “Miriam” and the short documentary “A Life in Blue.” She co-directed the former and directed the latter. As a...
DOC NYC 2021 Women Directors: Meet Kavery Kaul – “The Bengali”
Kavery Kaul is a filmmaker and the founder of riverfilms. She was born in India and is based in the U.S. Her works have been featured at DOC NYC, Telluride, London, Rotterdam and Sydney Festivals,...
DOC NYC 2021 Women Directors: Meet Bianca Stigter – “Three Minutes: A Lengthening”
Bianca Stigter is a historian and cultural critic. She made the short film essays “Three Minutes – Thirteen Minutes – Thirty Minutes” and “I Kiss This Letter –...
DOC NYC 2021 Women Directors: Meet Yunhong Pu – “Go Through the Dark”
Yunhong Pu is a director, editor, cinematographer, and producer based in New York City. Born and raised in China, she received her MFA in Social Documentary Film from SVA in 2019. “Go Through...
DOC NYC 2021 Women Directors: Meet Valerie Blankenbyl – “The Bubble”
Valerie Blankenbyl is an Austrian documentary filmmaker. She previously directed feature length documentaries “I Am Jesus” and “A Mother’s Dream.” “The Bubble”...
DOC NYC 2021 Women Directors: Meet Vera Krichevskaya – “F@ck This Job”
Vera Krichevskaya is a Russian filmmaker. She is the co-founder of TV Dozhd (TV Rain), which is the only independent private TV channel in Russia. She is an award-winning television director and has...
DOC NYC 2021 Women Directors: Meet Jamie Boyle – “Anonymous Sister”
Jamie Boyle is a two-time Emmy-winning documentary filmmaker. She is the director, cinematographer, and editor of the short documentary “Take A Vote” and she is the producer, editor, and...
DOC NYC 2021 Women Directors: Meet Alexandra Dalsbaek – “We Are Russia”
Alexandra Dalsbaek is a French-Russian filmmaker based in Moscow. Previously a freelance journalist, she made her documentary feature debut with “Cinderella Syndrome,” which premiered in...
Under the Radar: Rhiana Yazzie’s “A Winter Love” Showcases Inter-Tribal Romance & Celebrates Self-Love
From Sterlin Harjo’s “Reservation Dogs” on FX to Peacock’s “Rutherford Falls,” created by Sierra Teller Ornelas, Ed Helms, and Michael Schur, 2021 has offered audiences more Indigenous...