Timothy Blake Nelson is an American actor and playwright. Described as a "modern character actor", his roles include Delmar O'Donnell in O Brother, Where Art Thou? (2000), Gideon in Minority Report (2002), Dr. Pendanski in Holes (2003), Danny Dalton Jr. in Syriana (2005), Samuel Sterns in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Richard Schell in Lincoln (2012), the title character in The Ballad of Buster Scruggs (2018), and Henry McCarty in Old Henry (2021). He portrayed Wade Tillman / Looking Glass in the HBO limited series Watchmen (2019), for which he received a Critics' Choice Television Awards nomination for Best Supporting Actor in a Drama Series in 2020.
Takeshi Kitano, also known as Beat Takeshi in Japan, is a Japanese comedian, actor, and filmmaker. While he is known primarily as a comedian and TV host in his native Japan, he is better known abroad for his work as a filmmaker and actor as well as TV host.
Alejandro González Iñárritu is a Mexican filmmaker. He is primarily known for making modern psychological drama films about the human condition. His projects have garnered critical acclaim and numerous accolades including four Academy Awards with a Special Achievement Award, three Golden Globe Awards, three BAFTA Awards, two Directors Guild of America Awards. His most notable films include Amores perros (2000), 21 Grams (2003), Babel (2006), Biutiful (2010), Birdman (2014), The Revenant (2015), and Bardo (2022).
The San Diego Asian Film Festival (SDAFF) is an annual event organized by Pacific Arts Movement that takes place every November in San Diego, California.
Patrik-Ian Polk is an American director, screenwriter, and producer. Polk, who is gay, is noted for his films and theatre work that explore the experiences and stories of African-American LGBT people. In 2016, Polk was included in the Los Angeles Times Diverse 100 list, which described him as "the man bringing black gay stories to screens large and small".
Donari Braxton is an American filmmaker and writer. His independent narrative films are generally considered experimental, though have been featured diversely both in film festivals and art film reviews internationally. He's known for creating performance and video art for gallery exhibition, and with the 2013 launch of the photo/video series "how-to-be-alone.com", began freely releasing and distributing such content online. His work has been supported by NPR, the San Francisco Film Society, the Independent Filmmaker Project, Sundance, Film Independent, and the Berlinale Talents, amongst other institutions.
Sean Baker is an American film director, cinematographer, producer, screenwriter and editor. He is best known for the independent feature films Starlet (2012), Tangerine (2015), The Florida Project (2017), and Red Rocket (2021), as well as the Fox/IFC puppet sitcom Greg the Bunny and its spin-offs.
Matteo Garrone is an Italian filmmaker.
Shih-Ching Tsou is a Taiwan-born film producer, director, and actress. She co-directed the film Take Out (2004) with Sean Baker. She also produced Baker's other films Starlet (2012), Tangerine (2015), The Florida Project (2017) and Red Rocket (2021).
Cary Joji Fukunaga is an American filmmaker. He is known for directing critically acclaimed films such as the thriller Sin nombre (2009), the period drama Jane Eyre (2011), the war drama Beasts of No Nation (2015) and the 25th James Bond film, No Time to Die (2021). He also co-wrote the Stephen King adaptation It (2017). He was the first director of East Asian descent to win the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Directing for a Drama Series, as the director and executive producer of the first season of the HBO series True Detective (2014). He also directed and executive produced the Netflix limited series Maniac (2018), and executive produced and directed several episodes of the Apple TV+ miniseries Masters of the Air (2024).
Marwencol is a 2010 American documentary film that explores the life and work of artist and photographer Mark Hogancamp. It is the debut feature of director Jeff Malmberg, produced through his production company Open Face. It was the inspiration for Welcome to Marwen, a 2018 drama directed by Robert Zemeckis.
C.J. Obasi is a Nigerian film director, screenwriter and editor.
Eliza Hittman is an American screenwriter, film director, and producer from New York City. She has won multiple awards for her film Never Rarely Sometimes Always, which include the New York Film Critics Circle Award and the National Society of Film Critics Award—both for best screenplay.
Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi is an American documentary filmmaker. She was the director, along with her husband, Jimmy Chin, for the film Free Solo, which won the 2019 Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature. The film profiled Alex Honnold and his free solo climb of El Capitan in June 2017. Their first scripted film venture was Nyad, a biopic chronicling Diana Nyad's quest to be the first person to swim from Cuba to Florida.
Chloé Zhao is a Chinese-born filmmaker. She is known primarily for her work on independent films.
Jonas Carpignano is an American-Italian filmmaker. He is known for the films Mediterranea, A Ciambra, and A Chiara.
Hale County This Morning, This Evening is a 2018 American documentary film about the lives of black people in Hale County, Alabama. It is directed by RaMell Ross and produced by RaMell Ross, Joslyn Barnes, Su Kim, and is Ross's first nonfiction feature. The documentary is the winner of 2018 Sundance Film Festival award for U.S. Documentary Special Jury Award for Creative Vision, 2018 Gotham Independent Film Award for Best Documentary Feature and the Cinema Eye Honors Outstanding Achievement in Nonfiction Feature Filmmaking. It was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature. After its theatrical run, it aired on the PBS series Independent Lens and eventually won a 2020 Peabody Award.
Bishop Blay is a Liberian actor.
Ainu Mosir is a 2020 Japanese drama film directed by Takeshi Fukunaga. It features a story about a young Ainu boy, and deals with issues around the conflict between his personal thoughts, modern Japan, and the way of his traditional Ainu heritage. The film featured as a premier at the Tribeca Film Festival.
