VTIFF Program-Guide 2023 - Flipbook - Page 6
MEET THE FILMMAKERS AND OTHER SPECIAL GUESTS
MAX BARROWS (ALL YOU HEAR
IS NOISE)
Max was the story
consultant for All You Hear
Is Noise - reviewing
iterations of the film and providing
feedback to the creative team. Max is the
Outreach Director for Green Mountain
Self-Advocates. He mentors youth and
adults with developmental disabilities to
speak up for themselves and become
leaders. He received a White House
Champions of Change award in 2015 and a
Champion of Equal Opportunity award from
the National Association of Councils on
Developmental Disabilities in 2019. Max
served as a board member in VT for
Self-Advocates Becoming Empowered from
2008 to 2016.
NED CASTLE (ALL YOU HEAR IS
NOISE)
Ned is a director and
cultural researcher with a
background in
ethnographic filmmaking. Ned works with
media in cultural research, educational,
and commercial contexts that emphasize
collaboration and a deep engagement with
the ethics of representation. His approach
is influenced by more than a decade
working as a researcher and media
producer at the Vermont Folklife Center. He
operates an independent production and
research company, Frames to Life.
MIRYAM CHARLES (CETTE
MAISON)
Miryam Charles is a
Haitian-Canadian director,
producer and
cinematographer living in Montreal. She
has produced several short and feature
films. Her films have been presented in
various festivals in Quebec and
internationally. Her first feature film This
House was presented at the Berlinale, the
AFI film festival this year and was also
included in the TIFF Top 10 of the year .
She also launched the short film At Dusk at
the Locarno Film Festival. As a producer,
she is currently working on the postproduction of the series Still I Rise.
JEFF COHEN (ALL
GOVERNMENTS LIE)
Jeff Cohen is an author/
media critic, retired Ithaca
College journalism
professor, and founder of the media watch
group FAIR.ORG. He coproduced and
appears in “All Governments Lie.”
6
EVE FRANKEL (AFTER THE
FLOOD)
Eve has been part of The
Nature Conservancy team
in Vermont since 2014,
first as the Director of Strategic
Communications and as of October 2023
its new State Director. In her recent role as
Interim Director, Eve led Vermont’s
government relations, communications,
and engagement programs, to make their
greatest contributions to TNC’s 2030 goals,
while working to strengthen TNC’s
conservation approaches with diversity,
equity, inclusion, and justice principles as
its north star.
KRISTAN HANSON (WHITE
BALLS ON WALLS)
Kristan M. Hanson is the
Fleming Museum’s Curator
of Collections and
Exhibitions. Prior to joining the Fleming, she
held a digital managing editorship and an
academic year fellowship in plant
humanities at Dumbarton Oaks. She has
also worked at the University of Kansas’s
Spencer Museum of Art and the Art
Institute of Chicago.
FRED PEABODY (ALL
GOVERNMENTS LIE)
Vancouver-based Fred
Peabody is an Emmywinning filmmaker and
journalist whose credits include 7 years as
a producer-director on the acclaimed CBC
investigative program the fifth estate, and 7
years as a producer-director at ABC’s
20/20 in New York.
NATE POMMER (SCREAM OF MY
BLOOD: A GOGOL BORDELLO
STORY)
MELANIE HOLMES (ALL YOU
Nate Pommer is a director,
HEAR IS NOISE)
editor and producer who
Melanie is one of the main
participants of All You Hear has worked in a wide variety of genres for
clients like Vice, HBO, Showtime, CNN
Is Noise. She lives and
BRUCE GOLDSTEIN (THE ART OF
Originals, and Paramount Plus. His short
works in Chambersburg, PA with her
SUBTITLING)
Goldstein is best known for mother Jennifer Holmes - who also appears films and music videos have been featured
at TIFF, Slamdance, and the New York City
in the film. “Mel” was the first and only
his work as the repertory
Ballet. His music video “Monkey Vs Robot”
female to compete in a Special Olympics
programmer for New
for Burlington’s own James Kockalka
triathlon at the World Games level. She
York’s Film Forum in New York. He was
Superstar was one of the earliest viral
speaks to audiences about her experience
hired by Karen Cooper, director of Film
videos, ripping up 56k modems worldwide.
during the film-making process and is
Forum, to program the theater’s second
His film Nature of the Beast won best short
looking forward to visiting Vermont.
screen. Since then, he has produced four
at the 2007 Coney Island Film Festival.
repertory calendars for Film Forum a year.
EUGENE HÜTZ, (SCREAM OF MY
Scream of My Blood is his first feature
Goldstein has also created over 500 film
BLOOD: A GOGOL BORDELLO
length film.
festivals, and has been instrumental in
STORY)
putting over 1,000 new 35mm prints into
Eugene Hütz is a
PIERRE SIMENON (PANIQUE)
circulation. In 1997, Bruce founded Rialto
Ukrainian-born artist,
The son of Belgian novelist
Pictures, as a means to exhibit classics that
songwriter and frontman of international
Georges Simenon, Pierre,
were not in distribution in the U.S. He has
punk band Gogol Bordello, for which he has
born in Lausanne,
also worked closely on editing the subtitles
shared stages with System of a Down,
Switzerland, worked as a
of Rialto’s foreign-language films. In 2010
Rancid and Dropkick Murphys, dueted with financial analyst and portfolio manager in a
Goldstein was nominated by James
Regina Spektor, and cut albums with Rick
private bank in Geneva before leaving for
Billington, Librarian of Congress, to the
Rubin & Steve Albini. A lifelong lover of
the United States in 1987. After attending
Board of the National Film Registry.
punk growing up in Ukraine, Hütz found
Business School and Law School, he
himself playing acoustic sets in Ukranian
became an entertainment attorney in Los
DORNAZ HAJIHA (LIKE A FISH
bars in NCYC’s Lower East Side, his group
Angeles, and later worked as a SCUBA
ON THE MOON)
steadily growing to an 8-piece multicultural instructor in Malibu. A shark enthusiast and
Born in 1988 in Tehran,
band, combining Eastern, Western and
a history buff, Pierre Simenon currently
Dornaz Hajiha received
Latin traditions. A tireless advocate for
lives in Vermont with his two children.
her Bachelor of Arts in
Ukrainian solidarity, Hütz has partnered
Following his first novel, Au nom du sang
Graphic Design from Al Zahra University,
with Nova Ukraine and ArtDopomoga, and
versé, originally written in English and
Tehran, in 2011. She worked as a
assembled benefits with Patti Smith,
translated in half-a-dozen languages, he
photographer and graphic designer while
Matisyahu and more. Hütz has appeared in wrote an autobiographical story, “De père à
attending film workshops with maestros
such films as Liev Schreiber’s Everything Is père”, published in October 2015, and a
Asghar Farhadi and Bahram Beyzayi.
Illuminated and Madonna’s Filth and
second novel, L’enfant de Garland Road,
Hahiha entered London Film School in
Wisdom.
published in 2019. While researching for
2013. She completed her MA in Film
his next book, he works as an AI linguist
Production and graduated with distinction
LAUREN OATES (AFTER THE
and knowledge graph curator. But his most
in 2015. She made short films as well as a
FLOOD)
important and wonderful job is, and always
documentary, for which she was the writer.
Oates is the Director of
will be, father of his beloved children.
Her latest shorts, Marzieh and Marlon,
Policy and Governmental
produced in 2017, have been shown and
Affairs for TNC in Vermont.
LORI SINGER (RACHEL
awarded in numerous film festivals. Her
In this role, Lauren works with partners and
HENDRIX)
debut feature film Like a Fish on the Moon
key decision makers to advance natureBorn in Corpus Christi, TX,
has been selected in Proxima Competition
based policy and programmatic solutions.
Lori Singer studied cello
at the 56th Karlovy Vary Film Festival 2022.
She is especially interested in initiatives
with Barton Frank and
She is now developing her second feature
that support climate adaptation, flood
made her solo debut with the Oregon
Diaphanous produced by Chinese Shadows.
resilience and biodiversity.
Symphony at age 13. In New York City, Lori
studied acting with Fred Kareman, Stella
VTIFF.ORG | VERMONT INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL 2023
