Ragnar Bragason

Ragnar Bragason was born in Sudavik, Iceland in 1971. His debut feature film FIASCO eceived the Jury Award at The Cairo International Film Festival in 2000 and the Icelandic Cultural Award the same year. His second feature film, the internationally acclaimed CHILDREN, was awarded the Golden Swan for Best Film at The Copenhagen International Film Festival 2007, Best Director honors at the Transylvania International Film Festival in Romania 2007, the Jury Award at The Courmayeur Noir International Film Festival in Italy 2006 and was nominated for
a record number of Edda Awards at the The Icelandic Film Awards the same year. CHILDREN was named as one of The 10 Best European Films of 2006 by European-films.net. Bragason’s third feature PARENTS took home top honors at The Icelandic Film Awards in 2007, winning prizes for Best Film, Director, Screenplay, Actor In a Leading Role, Actress In a Leading Role and Best Cinematography. The same happened with his fourth feature MR. BJARNFREDARSON in 2009.

Outside of feature films, Bragason’s TV series The Prison Shift, The Day Shift, The Night Shift, The Girls and Fostbrothers have won awards for Best TV Drama/Comedy and are considered the most popular in the history of Icelandic television. His Shift series has been screened on various TV stations across Europe including the BBC. Bragason’s screenplay “The Whisperer” was nominated for the 2003 Sundance International Filmmakers Award as Screenplay of the Year. In 2012 Bragason wrote and directed his debut play Laburnum, staged at the Reykjavik City Theatre. Laburnum went on to receive eight nominations at the Icelandic Performing Arts Awards in 2013, and won Director Of The Year.

Bragason is also one of the most prominent film activists in Iceland, fighting for the support, growth and recognition of the art of film. He is currently the President Of The Association of Icelandic Film Directors and on the board of the Federation of Icelandic Artists. His most recent feature METALHEAD world premiered at the Toronto Film Festival and won 8 awards at the 2014 Icelandic Film Awards including Best Actress, Best Supporting Actor & Actress, and Original Score.

Cinelicious Pics Roster: Metalhead

Josephine Decker

Having started her career in documentaries, helping to produce for A&E, ABC and Discovery, Josephine Decker often builds her work from improvisation and collaboration with real communities. Her recent feature BUTTER ON THE LATCH – called “an utter exhilaration of cinematic imagination” by The New Yorker — is set at a real-life Balkan folk song and dance camp. The film, based on a Balkan folk song, explores the dark intimacy and neuroses of a female friendship, was included in Film Comment’s year-end list of Best Undistributed Films of 2013, and had its international premiere at the Berlinale 2014. Recently named one of Filmmaker Magazine’s 25 New Faces of Independent Film, Josephine recently completed her second narrative feature THOU WAST MILD & LOVELY. Starring Joe Swanberg, Robert Longstreet, Sophie Traub and Kristin Slaysman and inspired by a character from John Steinbeck’s “East of Eden,” THOU WAST MILD & LOVELY balances horror, beauty, and intimacy as an erotic thriller set in the wilds of Kentucky. In 2008, Josephine directed the documentary feature BI THE WAY, exploring the rise of bisexuality in America and available on Logo and Netflix. The film screened at SXSW, Silverdocs, and about 100 festivals worldwide and received write‐ups in The Austin Chronicle, Curve Magazine, The New York Times, New York Magazine, and The Dallas Morning News, among others. Josephine’s short films and music videos have played at MoMA, SXSW, Cucalorus, Maryland, and Austin Film Festival, have won children’s programming awards, and can be seen on PBS and Kidzbop.

Fortunate to be collaborating with artists she admires, Josephine Decker spent the past few years producing short videos for United Way, creative producing a doc for performance artist Sarah Small and acting in films by directors like Joe Swanberg, Onur Tukel and Spencer Parsons. Josephine also raises awareness about environmental issues through her performance art.

Cinelicious Pics Roster: Butter On The Latch & Thou Wast Mild and Lovely

ANURAG KASHYAP

Anurag Kashyap is known for his prolific and award-winning career in cinema, both as a director, screenwriter and as a producer. Among his noted directing credits are terrorist thriller BLACK FRIDAY about the deadly Mumbai bombings (which was banned for several years in India), cult classic DEV D, his epic gangster drama GANGS OF WASSEYPUR and UGLY, which screened at Director’s Fortnight at Cannes 2013 where he also received the Knight of the Order of Arts and Letters. His highly anticipated neo noir drama BOMBAY VELVET is set for worldwide release via 20th Century Fox. Widely regarded as the driving force of India’s new wave of filmmakers, Anurag also recently produced Michael Winterbottom’s TRISHNA and Ritesh Batra’s THE LUNCHBOX, the most successful foreign language film at U.S. theaters in 2014 to date.

Cinelicious Pics Roster: Gangs of Wasseypur

John Magary

John grew up in Dallas, Texas, and is a graduate of Williams College and Columbia University’s graduate film program. He has written and directed several short films, most notably the post-Katrina narrative The Second Line (Sundance; San Francisco; Tribeca; Edinburgh; IndieLisboa; Torino; National Finalist, Student Academy Awards; Special Jury Award, SXSW). His various grants include a Time Warner Storytelling Fellowship,an Annenberg Film Fellowship, a development grant from the Jerome Foundation, and a Grand Marnier Film Fellowship. His film criticism has appeared in Film Comment, Filmmaker, Hammer to Nail, and The Reeler, and his feature script Go Down, Antoinette went through the Sundance Directors and Screenwriters Labs. John was chosen as one of “25 New Faces of Independent Film” by Filmmaker Magazine. His work as a film editor includes Chris Teague’s Monkeywrench (Special Jury Prize, Dallas IFF) and Russell Harbaugh’s Rolling on the Floor Laughing (Sundance, New Directors / New Films).

Cinelicious Pics Roster: The Mend

Adam Rifkin

Adam Rifkin is a Writer/Director/Producer/Actor whose eclectic career ranges from broad family comedies to cult classics to dark and gritty urban dramas. Most recently Rifkin wrote, directed, oroduced and starred in REALITY SHOW (2013), a darkly satirical film about the world of reality television. The critically acclaimed drama premiered opening night of the 2013 SXSW Film Festival and follows the exploits of reality TV producer Micky Wagner and his amoral attempt to re-invent the reality genre by picking an average American family and putting them under all encompassing surveillance…without their knowledge. Rifkin also Wrote, Directed, Executive Produced and Starred in all 10 episodes of its compendium piece, Reality Show: The Series (2012), for Showtime.

Previously Rifkin Wrote and Directed the critically acclaimed and award-winning film LOOK (2007), a controversial drama that takes us into the foreboding world of surveillance and explores the conceit that the average American is captured on camera at least 300 times a day. Adam also Executive Produced Look: The Series (2010) for Showtime, which not only garnered critical accolades from outlets as eclectic as MSNBC’s Lawrence O’Donnell to Fox News’ Fox and Friends, but it was also the most highly rated series in its time slot in Showtime’s history. An A-list screenwriter, Rifkin has a penchant for family fare. He wrote UNDERDOG (2007) for Walt Disney Studios, a tent pole comedy based on the iconic 1960’s cartoon show ZOOM (2006), starring Tim Allen, and two hits for DreamWorks, MOUSEHUNT (1997) and SMALL SOLDIERS (1998). Continuing in the family film genre, he scribed the big screen versions of Where’s Waldo for Paramount/Nickelodeon and He-Man for John Woo and 20th Century Fox. His next foray into family entertainment will be Peeps, a Lego Movie-esque animated feature he’ll write and produce based on the iconic PEEPS candies.

Rifkin earned cult status when his film THE DARK BACKWARD (1991), which he wrote and directed, was named one of the top ten films of its year by The New York Post. He would then be immortalized as the director responsible for New Line Cinema’s DETROIT ROCK CITY (1999), a bona fide cult classic that continues to speak to and inspire generations of rock fans around the world. Rifkin gained critical recognition for NIGHT AT THE GOLDEN EAGLE (2001). The dark drama was an official selection of the London Film Festival and opened to rave reviews. Rifkin additionally wrote and directed THE CHASE (1994) starring Charlie Sheen and Kristy Swanson. The prophetic action film was called “awesome” by none other than James Cameron. His next journey into the director’s chair will be DIRECTOR’S CUT, a meta-thriller penned by Penn Jillette of Penn & Teller.

Cinelicious Pics Roster: Guiseppe Makes a Movie

Elena Tikhonova & Dominik Spritzendorfer

DOMINIK SPRITZENDORFER
Dominik Spritzendorfer was born in 1974 and studied at the Moscow Film Institute. He’s worked as a cinematographer for numerous award-winning documentaries including EVERYDAY REBELLION and POPULATION BOOM (2013). ELEKTRO MOSKVA is his first feature as co-director and cinematographer.

ELENA TIKHNOVA
Elena Tikhonova was borin in Obninsk, a Soviet “science city” affectionately known as “the town of the peaceful atom.” She is a graduate of The Russian Federation State Institute of Cinematography (“VGIK”) and since 2000 has worked as a cinematographer for documentary features in addition to her own work on shorts and experimental projects including METROPOLIS RELOADED (2007) and DOBRIJ VECHER, KONSTRUKTOR (2002). She also performs under the name VJ Mirniy Atom with various musical artists. ELEKTRO MOSKVA is her first feature as co-director.

Cinelicious Pics Roster: Elektro Moskva

Agnès Varda

Agnès Varda is a prolific filmmaker and visual artist born in Brussels in 1928 of Greek and French origins. She spent her childhood in Belgium with her four brothers and sisters. In 1940, WWII pushed the family to Sète in the South of France, where she would return to produce and direct her first feature.

Varda studied art history in Paris at the École du Louvre and photography at the École des Beaux-Arts. She became the official photographer of Jean Vilar and the Théâtre National Populaire. While in Paris, she met her future husband Jacques Demy, a French actor and filmmaker who passed in 1990.

After founding Ciné-Tamaris, she produced and directed her first feature, La Pointe Courte (1954), which anticipated the stylistic tendencies of the French New Wave, earning her the title “Grandmother of the New Wave.” It starred Philippe Noiret and Silvia Monfort, both of whom would become critically-acclaimed French actors.

Her best known works are: Cleo From 5 to 7, Le Bonheur, Sans Toit ni Loi, Jacquot de Nantes and The Gleaners and I, Vagabond.

In 2002, Varda was the recipient of the prestigious French Academy prize, Prix René Clair, for her cinematographic work and, in 2009, she was given the highest French decoration: the National Order of the Legion of Honor.

In 2008, Varda released her poetic autobiography, The Beaches of Agnès, to much acclaim. The film went on to win the César for Best Documentary in 2009. In December of 2011, her documentary series Agnès From Here to There aired as a five part series on ARTE France. Here, Varda liberally chronicled her travels and encounters with artists, both celebrated and undiscovered, engaging in conversations surrounding contemporary art.

Varda’s work is often associated with the French New Wave, and her early films were clear precedents for its stylistic tendencies, though it remains specific to her unique perspective, resisting the paradigms of all movements. Her films focus on the themes of aging, death, time, the collective unconscious, eroticism and social taboos. It is also distinct from the French New Wave in crossing genres and challenging forms, specifically that in which documentary and narrative are no longer distinguishable.

In 2013, she was president of the jury Caméra d’or at the Cannes Film Festival. Also in 2013, her work was exhibited in “Agnès Varda in Californialand” at The Los Angeles County Museum of Modern Art with the installation My Shack of Cinema, made with 35mm film strips of the film Lions Love (…and Lies), accompanying a cinema retrospective. – Sections excerpted from The European Graduate School.

Cinelicious Pics Roster: Jane B. Par Agnès V. & Kung-Fu Master!