Juries

Generation Kplus International Jury 2023

Venice Atienza (Philippines)

Venice Atienza is a Filipino documentarist. She co-founded Svemirko Film and Audiovisual Art Productions with Taiwanese director and producer, Fan Wu, and is a member of DAE (Documentary Association of Europe). Her first feature film, Last Days at Sea, premiered at the 71st Berlinale, Visions du Réel 2021, and Hot Docs and is supported by the IDFA Bertha Fund. It obtained a grant from DMZ Docs Rough Cut Presentation and awards at Visions du Réel – Rough Cut Lab 2020. Last Days at Sea is part of the IDFA Project Space 2020. Atienza is currently producing Taiwanese film director Fan Wu’s documentary entitled XiXi, which is part of CIRCLE – Women Doc Accelerator 2020.

Gudrun Sommer (Germany)

Gudrun Sommer is director of DOXS RUHR and founder of various festival formats in the documentary field. In 2002, the graduate in philosophy founded the festival doxs! and doku.klasse, a few years later the association Freunde der Realität e.V. and the regional festival DOXS RUHR. Before that, she worked as a committee member and festival director for Duisburg Film Week, and was a curator and jury member at Diagonale, steirischer herbst, the Golden Sparrow children’s media festival, the Goethe Institute, and the Grimme Prize, among others. Along with her office fair enough, as Green Consultant Film & TV she is committed to sustainable and collaborative cultural work.

Further members of this jury on the previous page

Youth Jury Generation 14plus 2023

The members of the 2023 Generation 14plus Youth Jury: Leia Haarhuis, Leo Hanstein, Anna Lena Hiemer, Anouk Segebart, Jonas Volkers.

Generation 14plus International Jury 2023

Kateryna Gornostai (Ukraine)

Kateryna Gornostai is a Ukrainian director and screenwriter. After gaining a degree in journalism, she studied at the School of Documentary Film and Theatre run by Marina Razbezhkina and Mikhail Ugarov in 2012. She made her debut as a documentary film director but later began working with fiction films and hybrid forms. In 2015, her short fiction film Away won the National Competition at Molodist International Film Festival. In 2021, her feature-length fiction debut Stop-Zemlia won the Crystal Bear for Best Film, awarded by the Youth Jury at Generation 14plus at the Berlinale. Alongside her work as a filmmaker and editor, she also teaches documentary filmmaking. Following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine she has stayed at home in Kyiv.

Fion Mutert (Germany)

Fion Mutert is a cinematographer and freelance media educator. In 2020, his debut feature film Nackte Tiere (Naked Animals, directed by Melanie Waelde) screened in Encounters at the Berlinale. The film was also shown in the Cross Section screenings with Generation and received a Special Mention from the jury of the GWFF Award Best First Feature, as well as nominations in four categories for the German Film Critics Award, including Best Cinematography. Fion participated in the Children’s Jury at Generation, also making films as a teenager that were screened and received awards at several film festivals. Since 2021 he has been studying Image Design/Cinematography at the German Academy of Film and Television Berlin (dffb).

Juanita Onzaga (Colombia)

Juanita Onzaga is a filmmaker and artist born in Colombia, based between Brussels, Bogotá and México. Her films interlace fiction with non-fiction, touching the importance of mysticism, ancestral knowledge and transformation of trauma from violent conflicts. Her works have been presented at Cannes Directors’ Fortnight, at the Berlinale in Generation, the MoMA of New York, IFFR and many more festivals and venues, while being awarded internationally. She is currently developing her first fiction feature film The Landscapes That You Seek and a series of installations about ancestral futurism.

GWFF Best First Feature Award Jury 2023

Ayten Amin (Egypt)

Ayten Amin, born in Alexandria in 1978, first studied film criticism at the Egyptian Cinema Writers & Critics Association and then film at the American University in Cairo before beginning her career as a director. After the documentary Tahir (2011), which she co-directed, celebrated its world premiere in Venice, she made her feature film debut two years later with Villa 69. With Souad, a Berlinale World Cinema Fund funding project, she was invited to the official selection of the festival in Cannes in 2020 and presented the film at the Berlinale Summer Special in 2021. Souad, which also won an award at the Tribeca Film Festival, represented Egypt in the Oscar race in 2021.

Judith Revault d’Allonnes (France)

Judith Revault d’Allonnes is a French programmer and has been head of cinema in the Department of Culture and Creation at the Centre Pompidou since September 2022. She joined the institution in 2000 as a programmer and has accompanied the most important figures of modern and contemporary cinema through retrospectives and exhibitions. Judith Revault d’Allonnes also contributes to magazines, notably as a member of the editorial board of “Trafic – Almanach de cinéma” and to collective works. She published an essay on Leos Carax’s Holy Motors (Yellow Now, 2016) and the first French-language book devoted to Kelly Reichardt: “Kelly Reichardt, l’Amérique retraversée” (De l’Incidence, Centre Pompidou, 2020).

Cyril Schäublin (Switzerland)

Cyril Schäublin was born in Zurich in 1984 and initially studied Mandarin and film at the Zhong Xi Academy in Beijingbefore completing his degree in directing at the DFFB in Berlin. Schäublin’s short films have been screened at numerous festivals worldwide. His feature-length film debut Those who are fine celebrated its premiere in 2017 at the Locarno Film Festival and went on to win many awards, including the award for Best Film at the Edinburgh International Film Festival. Unrest followed in 2022, which celebrated its world premiere at the Berlinale and received the Award for Best Director in Encounters. The film screened at festivals in Toronto, New York, San Sebastián, and Thessaloniki, and was presented with the FIPRESCI Award at the Viennale.

Jury Berlinale Documentary Award 2023

Emilie Bujès (France / Switzerland)

Emilie Bujès has been the artistic director of the festival Visions du Réel in Nyon since 2017. Among other activities, she has served as a programming consultant at Quinzaine des Réalisateurs in Cannes, a deputy artistic director at the Festival International du Film de La Roche-sur-Yon, and a commission member at Centre national des arts plastiques (CNAP) in Paris. She was a curator at the Centre d’Art Contemporain Genève; an instructor at the universities HEAD–Geneva and HKB in Bern; has contributed to the programme design of cultural institutions such as the Vilnius Contemporary Art Center and Transmediale, and has co-edited a book entitled “Encircling the Image of Trauma”. In 2014, she received the Swiss Art Award for Art and Architecture Mediation.

Diana Bustamante (Colombia)

In her roles as a producer, director and programmer, Diana Bustamante has been making significant contributions towards establishing Colombian cinema as an international constant for many years. Her productions have been presented in the Forum section at the Berlinale twice already: In 2010, Crab Trap by Oscar Ruíz Navia, which received the FIPRESCI Award, and in 2015, Jorge Forero’s Violencia. Her other production credits include César Augusto Acevedo’s Land and Shade (2015), Refugiado (2014) by Diego Lerman, and Julio Hernández’ Buy Me a Gun (2018), which celebrated their premieres at Cannes. She co-produced the film Memoria by Apichatpong Weerasethakul, which received the Jury Prize at Cannes in 2021, and from 2014 to 2018, she served as the artistic director of the Cartagena International Film Festival.

Mark Cousins - Scotland / Northern Ireland

Filmmaker and writer Mark Cousins’ themes are looking, cinema, childhood, politics and cities. His first feature documentary The First Movie (2009) won the Prix Italia. He received the Manfred Salzgeber Award at the Berlinale 2009. His 930-minute work The Story of Film: An Odyssey (2011) – based on his book of the same name and which screened in Berlinale Special, among others – received the Peabody Award and influenced film culture around the world. His other films include Atomic (2015), The Eyes of Orson Welles (2017), Women Make Film (2019) and The Story of Looking (2021). In 2022, his My Name is Alfred Hitchcock and The March on Rome premiered in Telluride and Venice, respectively.

Berlinale Series Award Jury 2023

Mette Heeno (Denmark)

The Danish screenwriter, showrunner and executive producer has already been a Berlinale Series guest with two series – the sitcom Splitting Up Together (2016), whose US remake with Jenna Fischer was produced by Ellen DeGeneres, and the crime drama Snow Angels (2021). Heeno completed her screenwriting studies at the prestigious National Film School of Denmark and has written over 20 films and series since graduating in 2001, including All Inclusive (2014), Park Road (2009-2010) and most recently the high-end series Carmen Curlers (since 2022) about the inventor of the electronic curling iron in the 1960s, which has already been commissioned for two more seasons.

André Holland (USA)

Last seen in Bones and All, actor André Holland alternates between theatre, series and film. Best known for his roles in Sugar (2008), Miracle at St. Anna (2008), 42 (2013), Passing (2021) and the two Academy Award-winning films Selma (2014) and Moonlight (2016), he appeared in numerous theatre productions, most recently as Othello at Shakespeare’s Globe in London. With Steven Soderbergh, he collaborated on High Flying Bird (2019) and the series The Knick (2014-2015). He was co-executive producer and starred in The Eddy (Berlinale Series 2020), Damien Chazelle’s love letter to jazz culture in Paris. Upcoming projects are the AppleTV+ series The Big Cigar and the movie The Actor with Gemma Chan, directed by Duke Johnson.

Danna Stern (Israel)

The Tel Aviv-born, Berlin-based producer and global content executive works across borders, genres and formats. She founded the Israeli yes Studios, a development and distribution powerhouse for high-end projects. Here she created Israeli series for a global audience, including Fauda (since 2015), Shtisel (2013-2021) and The Devil Next Door (2019), and was responsible for numerous international adaptations, including Your Honor (2020-2023) / Euer Ehren (2022) based on the Israeli original Kvodo (2017) and As We See It (2022) based on the original On the Spectrum (2018). Danna Stern has twice been named one of the “Top 500 Global Media Leaders” by industry magazine “Variety”.

All Awards & Juries 2023

Berlinale Awards & Juries 2023 (189 KB)

International Jury 2022

M. Night Shyamalan (USA) - Jury President

Screenwriter, director and producer M. Night Shyamalan has been captivating audiences worldwide with his genre films over the past three decades. His impressive filmmaking includes 14 feature films as a cinema director. His breakthrough, the 1999 psychological thriller The Sixth Sense starring Bruce Willis, was the second highest grossing film of that year and received six Academy Award nominations. He then released a string of blockbusters with Unbreakable (2000), Signs (2002), and The Village (2004). The Visit (2015) was the most successful horror film of 2015. He could repeat this success with his next film Glass (2019). Shyamalan has also had an equally successful start in the TV sector in 2015 with the 10-episode event series Wayward Pines for FOX, based on the best-selling novels. Currently Shyamalan serves as showrunner for the award-winning series Servant for Apple TV+. He has also directed several episodes of the series. His latest cinema film Old, which is based on the graphic novel "Sandcastle" was released internationally in cinemas in summer 2021. He is currently working on his next cinema film, Knock at the Cabin, which will be released in February 2023.

Karim Aïnouz (Brazil / Algeria)

Karim Aïnouz first studied architecture in Paris and Brasilia before doing a degree in film studies at New York University and gaining practical experience as an assistant director for Todd Haynes. His feature film debut Madame Satã premiered at Cannes in 2002, later O Céu de Suely (Love for Sale, 2006) and Viajo Porque Preciso, Volto Porque te Amo (I Travel Because I Have To, I Come Back Because I Love You, 2009) screened in Venice. Aïnouz is also a regular guest at the Berlinale: in 2014, with Praia do Futuro (Futuro Beach) was shown in Competition; at the same time, Cathedrals of Culture ran in Berlinale Special, where he was one of six directors. His two documentaries Zentralflughafen THF (2018), awarded the Amnesty International Prize, and Nardjes A. (2020) were both shown in Panorama. His feature film A Vida Invisível (Invisible Life) won the main prize in Un Certain Regard section at Cannes in 2019, and two years later his autobiographical work O Marinheiro das Montanhas (Mariner of the Mountains) also screened at the Croisette.

Saïd Ben Saïd (France / Tunisia)

Saïd Ben Saïd is a French-Tunisian film producer, founder and chairman of SBS Productions. His large output of 40 films includes films directed by Paul Verhoeven, David Cronenberg, Roman Polanski, Brian De Palma, Nadav Lapid, Philippe Garrel, Walter Hill, Alain Corneau, Kleber Mendonça Filho, André Téchiné and Ira Sachs. Recent releases include: David Cronenberg’s Maps to the Stars with Julianne Moore who won Best Actress in Cannes in 2014, Paul Verhoeven’s Elle which was awarded with Best Foreign Picture at the 2017 Golden Globes, Nadav Lapid’s Synonyms which won the 2019 Golden Bear at the Berlinale and Kleber Mendonça Filho’s Bacurau which received the 2019 Jury Prize in Cannes. His latest production is Paul Verhoeven’s Benedetta, which premiered in the Competition at Cannes 2021. In 2015, Ben Saïd founded his distribution company SBS Distribution and his international sales arm SBS International to service his own productions.

Anne Zohra Berrached (Germany)

Anne Zohra Berrached, born in Erfurt in 1982 as the daughter of a German and an Algerian, first studied social pedagogy and worked as a theatre pedagogue in London before turning to filmmaking. After her first own short documentary film Der Pausenclown (2009), she studied at the Filmakademie Baden-Württemberg. Her first feature-length film Zwei Mütter (Two Mothers) was awarded the section prize in the Perspektive Deutsches Kino at the Berlinale in 2013, and three years later 24 Wochen (24 Weeks) ran for the Golden Bear in the Competition. The film was awarded the German Film Award in Silver and received the GUILDE Film Award. Berrached, who usually has professional actors act together with amateurs in her films and focuses on the greatest possible authenticity, presented her most recent film Die Welt wird eine andere sein (Copilot) in the section Panorama of the Berlinale in 2021. In addition to her cinema work, the filmmaker has directed three highly acclaimed Tatort episodes.

Tsitsi Dangarembga (Zimbabwe)

Zimbabwean filmmaker and writer Tsitsi Dangarembga studied at Cambridge and the University of Zimbabwe before coming to Berlin to study directing at the German Film and Television Academy. As a screenwriter or director, she has been involved in several of her home country's cinematic milestones, including Neria (1991), Flame (1996), Everyone's Child (1996) and I Want a Wedding Dress (2011). In 1992, she founded her own production company, Nyerai Films, and in 2003, the International Film Festival for Women in Harare, which also gave birth to the African Women Filmmakers' Development Hub. She is also one of the co-founders of the Institute of Creative Arts for Progress in Africa (ICAPA) Trust. Dangarembga's most recent novel “This Mournable Body”, was shortlisted for the Booker Prize in 2020, which belongs to a three-part series including “Nervous Conditions” (1988) and “The Book of Not” (2006). In 2021, she was awarded the “Friedenspreis des deutschen Buchhandels“ as well as the PEN Pinter Prize and the PEN International Award for Freedom of Expression.

Ryûsuke Hamaguchi (Japan)

Ryûsuke Hamaguchi's episodic film Gûzen to sôzô (Wheel of Fortune and Fantasy) premiered in the Competition at the Berlinale in 2021, where it won the Silver Bear Grand Jury Prize. In the same year, he also received the Best Screenplay Prize for an adaptation of Murakami’s Doiraibu mai kâ (Drive My Car), which premiered at the Cannes Film Festival. Hamaguchi’s graduation film Passion from the Tokyo University of the Arts, screened at the San Sebastián Film Festival in 2008. This was followed by the feature film The Depths and the documentary Tōhoku Trilogy (Nami no oto (Sound of the Waves), Nami no koe (Voices from the Waves), Storytellers), which he directed together with Ko Sakai between 2011 and 2013. His international breakthrough came in 2015 with Happî awâ (Happy Hour), which celebrated its world premiere in Locarno. Three years later, he was invited to the competition in Cannes with Netemo sametemo (Asako I & II). In addition to his directing work, he also wrote the screenplay for Kiyoshi Kurosawa's Supai no tsuma (Wife of a Spy), which won the Silver Lion for Best Director at Venice in 2020.

Connie Nielsen (Denmark / USA)

Connie Nielsen was born in Denmark where she started her career on stage alongside her mother in political Revue and Variety shows. She moved to France and Italy as a young woman to continue her studies and further her acting career internationally. Once in the US, she starred in Ridley Scott's Oscar winner Gladiator (2000), Mission to Mars (2000) by Brian de Palma and Basic (2003). She first appeared in a Danish production for Susanne Bier's Brothers (2004) for which she was nominated for the European Film Award, among others, and received Best Actress awards in San Sebastián and the Danish film prize The Bodil. Nielsen has also worked with directors such as Olivier Assayas (Demonlover, 2002) and Lars von Trier (Nymphomaniac: Vol.1, 2013) and appeared in blockbusters such as Wonder Woman (2017) by Patty Jenkins and Zack Snyder's Justice League (2021). Most recently, she was a lead actress and executive producer on the British series Close to Me (2021). Nielsen is also the founder of the organisations Human Needs Project and Road to Freedom Scholarships.

Jury Encounters 2022

Chiara Marañón (Spain)

Spanish born Chiara Marañón is the Director of Content at MUBI. She holds a BA in Cinema Studies and two MAs from the International Film & TV School in Cuba and the University of Westminster. Marañón has served as a jury member at international film festivals including Mar del Plata or Jeonju, and curated programmes for FICCI in Cartagena and Tabakalera Centre for Contemporary Art in San Sebastián. As a filmmaker, she directed The Girl in The Lemon Factory (2013), working together with Iranian master Abbas Kiarostami on the screenplay. One of the first to join the company over ten years ago, Marañón currently spearheads MUBI’s global content acquisitions and programming, with a focus on Europe, supporting partnerships and overseeing content for MUBI GO in the United Kingdom.

Ben Rivers (United Kingdom)

Ben Rivers is a British artist and filmmaker. He won the FIPRESCI Prize at the Venice Film Festival in 2011 for his first feature film Two Years at Sea. In 2014 he was awarded his second Tiger Award for Short Film for Things at the International Film Festival Rotterdam, and in 2015 he was nominated for the Golden Leopard at Locarno for The Sky Trembles and the Earth Is Afraid and the Two Eyes Are Not Brothers. Rivers’ short film The Hunchback, which he co-directed with Gabriel Abrantes and which won three awards, also premiered at Locarno. Together with Ben Russell, Rivers directed two films: A Spell to Ward Off the Darkness and The Rare Event, with which he was a guest at the Berlinale Forum Expanded in 2018.

Silvan Zürcher (Switzerland)

Silvan Zürcher is a Swiss producer, screenwriter and director. He studied philosophy, film and German studies in Bern and Zurich, then film production at the DFFB in Berlin. His first feature film Das merkwürdige Kätzchen (The Strange Little Cat, director: Ramon Zürcher) premiered in 2013 at the Forum of the Berlinale and was subsequently celebrated at numerous international festivals and won many awards. In 2017, he founded the production company Zürcher Film together with his brother Ramon Zürcher. In 2021, their second feature film Das Mädchen und die Spinne (The Girl and the Spider, co-directed with Ramon Zürcher) celebrated its world premiere in the Berlinale’s international competition Encounters and was awarded the prize for Best Director and the FIPRESCI Prize.

International Short Film Jury 2022

Rosa Barba (Italy) - Artist, Filmmaker

Artist and filmmaker Rosa Barba’s work encompasses films, sculptures, installations, live performances, texts and publications based on the material and conceptual qualities of cinema. She creates installations and site-specific interventions that explore how film defines the physical quality of the space, and places the work and viewer in a new relationship. Her cinematic works are set in undefined time periods and move between experimental documentary and narrative fiction. Her works are represented in international collections, renowned institutions and have been presented in biennials around the world, including Tate Modern London, Dia Art Foundation New York, Pirelli Hangar Bicocca Milan, Arter Istanbul, Jeu de Paume Paris, Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía Madrid, Schirn Kunsthalle Frankfurt and the Biennale di Venezia. And for its reopening in 2021, the Neue Nationalgalerie in Berlin featured an exhibition of Rosa Barba’s work.

Payal Kapadia (India) - Filmmaker

Payal Kapadia’s poetic, deeply personal and highly political debut feature A Night of Knowing Nothing premiered in the Quinzaine des Réalisateurs at Cannes in 2021, where it received the L’Œil d’Or as the best documentary film across all festival sections. Dubbed “one of the year’s most electrifying debuts,” it also garnered awards at the Toronto International Film Festival and the Mar del Plata International Film Festival. Her latest short, And What Is the Summer Saying, premiered at the 2018 Berlinale and went on to win the Special Jury Prize at the International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam. In 2017, Payal Kapadia celebrated her Cannes debut with Afternoon Clouds screening in the Cinéfondation section for young directors, after her short The Last Mango Before the Monsoon had won her the FIPRESCI prize as well as the Special Jury Prize at the 2015 International Short Film Festival Oberhausen. A Berlinale Talents alumna, she is currently working on her next feature film in Mumbai.

Reinhard W. Wolf (Germany) - Film and Media Art Curator, Writer

Reinhard W. Wolf heads the Mainz community cinema CinéMayence which is known not only for its carefully curated film programmes but also for being able to screen all kinds of formats – including Super 8 films. As a writer, his main thematic focus is on new media and short film. He works as a freelance editor for the online short film magazine shortfilm.de and has written numerous magazine articles and contributions to books as well as two studies on the situation of short films in Germany: Expertise zur Situation des deutschen Kurzfilms (An Expert Look at the Situation of German Short Film, Oberhausen: 1998) and Kurzfilm in Deutschland – Studie zur Situation des kurzen Films (Short Film in Germany – A Study of the Situation of the Short Film, Dresden: 2006). He has been working as a film and media art curator for exhibitions and film festivals at home and abroad for many years, especially for the International Short Film Festival Oberhausen.

Children’s Jury Generation Kplus 2022

A Children's Jury with members aged 11 to 14 awards the Crystal Bears in the Generation Kplus competition. The jury members are selected from film questionaires submitted the previous year and officially invited to participate by the Festival Director.

The members of the 2022 Generation Kplus Children's Jury: Tilda Aue, Maria Fock, Connar Beck Lowe, Henri Maritoh, Leonardo Urrutia Schwarze, Kerstin Teichmann and Ida Lilli Zschaubitz.

Generation Kplus International Jury 2022

Daniela Cajías (Bolivia)

The Bolivia-born cinematographer became the first woman to receive the Spanish film award Goya in 2021 for her work on Pilar Palomero’s award-winning feature debut Las niñas. The film celebrated its world premiere in 2020 in the Generation Kplus competition. Daniela Cajías was also represented at Generation with As duas Irenes (2017) and La eterna noche de las doce lunas (2013) - two films that were successful at international festivals and received numerous awards.

Nicola Jones (Germany)

Born in Halle/Saale, with stations in Leipzig, Munich and Berlin, Nicola Jones worked as a consultant and speaker in the area of film funding as well as international film relations and EU film policy. In 2016, she took over the direction of the German Children’s Media Festival Goldener Spatz. As managing director of the Children’s Media Foundation of the same name, she remains active at European level with the KIDS Regio initiative.

Samuel Kishi Leopo (Mexico)

Born in Mexico, the director, screenwriter and editor studied audiovisual arts in Guadalajara and made numerous short films before presenting his feature film debut Somos Mari Pepa at Generation in 2014. In 2020, he was awarded the Grand Prix of the International Jury Generation Kplus with Los lobos and the Peace Film Prize which is awarded during the Berlinale. Samuel Kishi Leopo has been the Goodwill Ambassador of the UN Organization for Migration (IOM) since 2021.

Youth Jury Generation 14plus 2022

A Youth Jury with members aged 14 to 18 awards the Crystal Bears in the Generation 14plus competition. The jury members are selected from film questionaires submitted the previous year and officially invited to participate by the Festival Director.
The members of the 2022 Generation 14plus Youth Jury: Luise Dahns, Christian Fock, Quintus Gramowski, Viola Weiser and Helene Alma Zschaubitz.

Generation 14plus International Jury 2022

Paolo Bertolin (Italy)

The film critic and curator works prolifically as a festival programmer for the Venice International Film Festival and as an artistic consultant for various international film festivals and institutions. As a producer, the native Italian has already been represented in the Berlinale Competition several times with films (Cha và con và, Hele Sa Hiwagang Hapis, Chitrashala).

Rubika Shah (United Kingdom / Australia)

The award-winning British-Australian director, screenwriter and winner of the BAFTA Breakthrough 2020 made her debut in the Generation 14plus competition in 2015 with Let's Dance: Bowie Down Under. In 2017, she presented her short film White Riot: London to the Berlinale audience. In 2020, she returned to Berlin with the long documentary work White Riot and received the Special Mention of the Generation Youth Jury. Rubika Shah is currently working on A Saudi Tale for BBC Film.

Dash Shaw (USA)

With his debut film My Entire Highschool Sinking into the Sea, the comic book author and animator made his first guest appearance at Generation in 2017. His second feature film, Cryptozoo, premiered at the Sundance Film Festival and won the NEXT Innovator Award. At the 71st Berlinale, the animated film received a special mention in the 14plus competition from Generation’s International Jury. The American is the author of several graphic novels, most recently “Discipline” was published by New York Review Comics.

Jury GWFF Best First Feature Award 2022

Gaia Furrer (Italy)

Born in 1975 in Italy, Gaia Furrer graduated in Cinema History at the University La Sapienza in Rome. She collaborated with Film Italia, the public agency in charge of promoting Italian cinema abroad, curating national and international projects. Furrer has also programmed and consulted on a few film festivals. Since 2004, she has worked as Head of Programming at the Noir in Festival, one of the most important European festivals focused on the film noir genre. After working as a programmer and as Head of Programming since the very first edition at Giornate degli Autori, the independent sidebar of the Venice Film Festival, she was appointed as its new Artistic Director in 2020.

Vimukthi Jayasundara (Sri Lanka)

Vimukthi Jayasundara is an award-winning Sri Lankan director known for his surreal films. After finishing his documentary, Land of Silence (2002), he made his directorial debut with Forsaken Land (2005), which won the Camera d’Or for best first feature at Cannes. This was followed by Between Two Worlds (2009), which competed at the Venice Film Festival, Chatrack (2011), which went on to be selected for Directors’ Fortnight at Cannes and Dark in the White Light, which was selected for the Competition at Locarno in 2015. In 2012, he was invited to be one of three international directors to produce a film for the Jeonju Digital Project. He is currently developing his new feature Turtle’s Gaze on Spying Stars.

Shahrbanoo Sadat (Afghanistan)

Shahrbanoo Sadat is an Afghan filmmaker, who was recently evacuated from Kabul, when the Taliban seized power in August 2021. Her filmography involves the debut film Wolf and Sheep, which won the top award at the Cannes’ Directors’ Fortnight in 2016. Her second feature Parwareshgah (The Orphanage) was supported by, among others, the Berlinale World Cinema Fund and also premiered in the Directors’ Fortnight in 2019. Both films are part of a five-part series based on Anwar Hashimi’s autobiographical text of 800 pages. Since 2020, Sadat has been working on the third part, a romantic comedy called Kabul Jan based in Kabul before the current political situation.