guests
september 2024
Laurence Coriat
Laurence Coriat was born in France and moved to London in her early twenties. She wrote Michael Winterbottom’s WONDERLAND, which was selected in competition at Cannes in 1999 and won the best British Independent Film award that year. She cowrote Sandra Goldbacher’s ME WITHOUT YOU, starring Michelle Williams and Anna Friel, which was unveiled at the Venice Film Festival in 2001. She went on to collaborate with Michael Winterbottom in 2006 on A MIGHTY HEART, an adaptation of Marianne Pearl’s account of her husband’s kidnapping and murder, starring Angelina Jolie. She co-wrote Winterbottom’s GENOVA, which starred Colin Firth as a man struggling to cope with the death of his wife.
She worked with Marc Evans on PATAGONIA (2010), a Welsh-Argentine drama starring Mathew Rhys, and HUNKY DORY (2011), starring Minnie Driver. In 2012 Coriat continued her collaboration with Winterbottom on the film EVERYDAY, which charts the relationship between a man imprisoned for drug smuggling and his wife, and was shot over the course of five years, a few weeks at a time. The film was nominated for a Best Single Drama Bafta in 2013.
2015 sees the release of LADY GREY, set in South Africa, starring Peter Sarsgaard and Emily Mortimer and directed by Alain Choquart. In 2016, she took part in a writers room with show-runner Hossein Amini and wrote two episodes (5&6) of McMAFIA, Amini’s International Emmy award winning BBC series, directed by James Watkins. She worked on ICARUS, an Iain Softley project about British astronaut Michael Foale, who overcame a series of crises aboard the Mir space station.
Joanna Duncombe
Jo is a film and cultural relations specialist, based between London and Marseille. Spanning creative production, film programming and new talent development, Jo has a wealth of experience developing innovative, international film and arts programmes. She cares deeply about connecting audiences to original storytelling through intrinsically global projects, and building thriving communities around creative culture. Through her work at British Council, she has developed a unique sensitivity to developing cultural programmes that connect artists and communities across many global contexts.
Jo has presented programmes across numerous world-renowned festivals, and hosted talks and Q&As at events including Cannes Film Festival, London Film Festival and IFFR. Her current clients include British Council, BAFTA, the National Film & Television School and the Victoria Film Festival. At British Council, Jo is the senior consultant responsible for the Film Department’s New Talent programmes. She is also a senior consultant for the International Collaboration Programme, working with artists across multiple disciplines around the world to facilitate community and connections.
Jo is a film festival expert and offers regular consultancies to short and early-career filmmakers, both privately, and through tutoring at film schools like the National Film & Television School. She has previously worked as a film programmer for the Independent Cinema Office in the UK, and was programme director at London Short Film Festival. She was the creative producer and programmer at Birds Eye View Films, where she helped to develop and launch their highly successful Reclaim the Frame programme alongside Mia Bays.
Len Rowles
Len Rowles is a seasoned executive and producer known for her focus on visionary filmmakers and clear genre stories with global resonance. Her role at Climate Spring is to support film and international TV productions weave the climate crisis directly or indirectly into their projects, and provide editorial and market support from development through to distribution. Len joined Climate Spring from Protagonist Pictures, where she built and managed the company’s in-house development and production slate, and produced the inaugural title; Walter Mosley’s THE MAN IN THE BASEMENT, directed by Nadia Latif and starring Corey Hawkins and Willem Dafoe, for Disney-ESPN’s Andscape. Len also served on Protagonist’s EP team, which secured private finance and structured co-productions on slate projects including THE OUTRUN and THE DAMNED. Prior to Protagonist, Len ran the development slate at two-time Oscar nominated Wildgaze Films and was on the Creative Team at Pathé UK. Len has been drawn to climate storytelling since her earliest films; BIFA nominated SKYBORN and BAFTA and EFA nominated ORBIT EVER AFTER.
Recognised as a Screen Star of Tomorrow and one of Moviescope’s One’s to Watch, Len's passion for impactful storytelling continues to shape her career.
Delia Vasile
Delia Vasile is a communicator, psychologist and psychotherapist with a humanistic approach, based in Bucharest, Romania. She graduated from the Faculty of Letters and the Faculty of Psychology and since 2012 she has started her training in Transactional Analysis with Yorkshire Training Centre International. She has had learning experiences and professional training in Romania, Great Britain, Germany, France and the USA. She has a professional background in communication, public relations and entrepreneurship, which she uses in order to understand human and social experience from a wide range of perspectives. Since 2015, she has worked in private practice as a psychotherapist, with individuals and couples. Her therapeutic approach is a narrative one, being passionate about understanding life stories and the scripts people act out in their lives.
residents
september 2024
Stella Carneiro
Stella Carneiro is a Brazilian director and awarded screenwriter who has a degree in Cinema from FAAP/São Paulo and an M.A in Screenwriting through the Erasmus program Kino Eyes.
The shorts she wrote were selected to over fifty film festivals around the world, such as PÖFF, Brussels International Short Film Festival and Odense International Film Festival in Denmark. As a director, she has secured funds for her next comedy short, PARTY PASTEL, while GOLDEN SHOWER, her directorial debut, premiered at IndieLisboa during the summer.
Denisse Conn Tübacü
Denisse Conn Tübacü is a Bucharest-based filmmaker. After attending Transilvania IFF’s workshop for teenagers “Let’s Go Digital” in 2012, and NISI MASA - European Network of Young Cinema she studied Film Directing at UNATC Bucharest. Her first independent short LIKE MOTHER USED TO SING premiered in Transilvania IFF in 2021. She is also developing as a performing arts director, experimenting with the body as a theme and with direct connection with the audience, having her debut at The National Centre for Dance Bucharest with a performance piece about anxiety, “feelings are just visitors”. Currently, she is co-directing an independent documentary and is in post-production with a short film, ROSEBUDS, with the support of Romanian Film Centre and produced by Tangaj Production.
Anthony Foussard
With dual expertise in the fields of dramaturgy and ecological transition (development, management of natural spaces, design of sustainable projects), Anthony Foussard has been the director of Canopée since its creation. His work focuses on the link between health and nature, ecosystem services and the creation of new ecological narratives. He works with local authorities and institutions in mainland France, the French overseas territories and Europe. After a first career in multimedia storytelling, Anthony is back to defend his ecological convictions through fiction.
Sai Haval
Sai Haval is a writer and filmmaker from India. She graduated in Filmmaking from Srishti Institute of Art Design and Technology and has a post-graduate degree in Screenwriting from the University of East Anglia, UK.
Sai has written many shows for Indian OTT platforms in various genres. Currently, she is developing a coming-of-age drama for Amazon India and an independent feature of her own through an Indian Fellowship for debut directors.
Christian Legrand
After studying philosophy at the University of Paris X-Nanterre, Christian Legrand became involved in societal issues relating to health and biotechnology (genome programme, biomedical research) in the early 1990s. For 15 years, Christian worked as a consultant in biomedical ethics for various institutions (Ministry of Research, health establishments, associations, etc.). From 2012, he worked with Les Films du Tambour (SIBEL, DÉGRADÉ, NOTRE-DAME DU NIL, GAZA MON AMOUR) and helped proofread over 50 scripts. Christian now writes his own screenplays, some in collaboration with Anthony Foussard.
Hannu-Pekka Peltomaa
Hannu-Pekka Peltomaa is a Finnish filmmaker. He has graduated from ELO Film School Finland, Aalto University. Peltomaa has directed six short films, of which he has written four. Currently he is developing/writing three feature films and a few short films.
His films often explore themes of loneliness, disconnection from others, and the search for one’s place in the world. He is particularly interested in characters who are shy, even fearful; bystanders who find the world challenging due to their own shortcomings.
Gabriela Serrano
Sisters Gabriela Serrano (director/writer) and Mariana Serrano (actor/writer) are a Filipino filmmaking duo. Together they founded Studio Dalaga, a Manila-based independent production outfit known to play with genre and form with a tender yet subversively feminist eye. Their cinematic/ audiovisual collaborations have won awards at international film festivals (Singapore, BIFAN, FNC Montréal), and have been featured on the Criterion Channel, Vogue Philippines, and Manila Community Radio. They made their debut in 2021 with DIKIT, a split-screen spin on Philippine folklore, and are currently developing their first feature, PLEASE BEAR WITH ME, a speculative call center drama.
Mariana Serrano
Sisters Gabriela Serrano (director/writer) and Mariana Serrano (actor/writer) are a Filipino filmmaking duo. Together they founded Studio Dalaga, a Manila-based independent production outfit known to play with genre and form with a tender yet subversively feminist eye. Their cinematic/ audiovisual collaborations have won awards at international film festivals (Singapore, BIFAN, FNC Montréal), and have been featured on the Criterion Channel, Vogue Philippines, and Manila Community Radio. They made their debut in 2021 with DIKIT, a split-screen spin on Philippine folklore, and are currently developing their first feature, PLEASE BEAR WITH ME, a speculative call center drama.
Victoria Visco Mendonça
Victoria Mendonça is a screenwriter and director with a degree in Film from PUC-RJ, studies in Philosophy at UFRJ, and an MFA in Directing and Screenwriting from EICAR in France. Her short film SHE WALKS premiered at the International Film Festival Rotterdam and screened at festivals across the U.S. and Europe. After working as a researcher at RSA Films UK, she now collaborates with leading Brazilian production companies like Conspiração, RT Features, Biônica, and O2 Filmes.
Victoria co-directed the short film CAIÇARA as part of INTERACTIONS, an initiative by Art For The World. She also directs advertising campaigns, music videos, and content for sustainability and human rights initiatives.
Currently, she is completing the documentary SCAZZICARE, a Russia-France co-production, and developing AS ONDAS, a Brazil-Netherlands co-production, selected for the CoPro Market at DOK Leipzig and the Circle Women Doc Accelerator.
Yuan Yuan
Yuan Yuan is a Chinese writer-director. Her previous short films won Best Student Film at DGA Student Film Award, Best Student Film at both the Palm Springs International ShortFest and the Aspen Shortsfest, and the Jury Prize at the Hong Kong International Film Festival. Currently, she is developing her first feature project, LATE SPRING, which has been selected by Sundance Screenwriters & Directors Labs, while it won Best Young Talent Project at Shanghai International Film Festival in China. Yuan is a recent graduate from NYU Tisch Grad Film Program.