Academy Award-winning American sound designer Mark Mangini, Cannes Film Festival veterans American director James Gray and Austrian film director and screenwriter Jessica Hausner are confirmed as the first three Qumra Masters of the Doha Film Institute’s (DFI) annual talent incubator for emerging global talent, taking place from March 20-25.
In the 6th edition of Qumra, the three prolific filmmakers will deliver Master Classes to upcoming filmmakers from Qatar and around the world, providing them with unique creative development and mentorship opportunities.
Qumra also provides participants with thorough mentoring sessions and tutorials led by global film industry experts. “We are deeply honoured to welcome three distinctive voices of modern cinema to this year’s Qumra Masters, who have each created a cinematic legacy for generations to come,” DFI CEO Fatma Hassan al-Remaihi said in a press statement. “Now in its sixth edition, Qumra is synonymous with professional development and knowledge-exchange, drawing on the unparalleled expertise of some of the world’s finest minds within the industry.
All the Masters we have had at Qumra to date are luminaries in world cinema, who brought a unique perspective on filmmaking that has incredibly benefited emerging filmmakers in their journey to creative excellence,” she noted.
“The latest edition of Qumra will continue its presence as a unique and important platform and project incubator for important voices and compelling stories in Arab and world cinema,” al-Remaihi added.
DFI artistic adviser Elia Suleiman noted: “The works of Mangini, Gray and Hausner have a vivid place in the history of world cinema. A renaissance man of modern filmmaking, Mangini’s work consistently enrich the cinematic landscape, while Hausner provokes and entices audiences with her defiant portrayals of gender, love and faith, and converging our perceptions of reality, Gray produces poetic images that mirror the true depth of human emotions. Our first three Qumra Masters for 2020 present exciting insights into modern filmmaking and will be an inspiration to all.”
New York City native Gray is a film director and screenwriter. He went on to study at the University of Southern California School of Cinematic Arts before making his feature directorial debut with the crime drama Little Odessa (1994) at the age of 25 which won the Silver Lion award at the 51st Venice International Film Festival.
He has made six other features, four of which competed for the Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival.
His body of work includes The Yards (2000), We Own the Night (2007) starring Joaquin Phoenix, Two Lovers (2008), The Immigrant (2013), The Lost City of Z (2016) and the sci-fi adventure Ad Astra (2019).
Born in Vienna, Austria, in 1972, Hausner studied directing at the Film Academy of Vienna where she made the award-winning short films Flora (1996) and Inter-View (1999), which won the Jury Prize of the Cannes Cinefondation. Her body of work includes the Cannes nominated feature films Lovely Rita (2001) and Hotel (2004) selected to the Festival’s Un Certain Regard segment.
Her feature Lourdes (2009), won the FIPRESCI Prize at the 66th Venice Film Festival. In 1999, Hausner founded the Viennese film production company coop99. She was appointed a member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences in 2017. Her fifth feature film Little Joe (2019) premiered in competition at the 2019 Cannes Film Festival where its lead actress won the award for Best Actress.
Born in 1956 in Boston, Massachusetts, Mangini grew up as a musician and attended Holy Cross College as a foreign language major.
His passion for filmmaking and music prompted a move to Los Angeles in 1976, where he launched his career in sound department working for children’s cartoons before founding Weddington Productions – a successful post-production sound company that he ran for 25 years.
His extensive body of work as a supervising sound editor, sound designer, and recording mixer earned him five Oscar nominations for Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home (1986), Aladdin (1992), The Fifth Element (1997), and Blade Runner 2049 (2017).
He won the award in 2015 for his work on Mad Max: Fury Road (2015).
Source:gulf-times.com
