TIFF.23 Juries

The TIFF.23 Official Competition jury includes Sibel Kekilli, one of the most acclaimed German actresses, who debuted in Gegen die Wand (Head-On, dir. Fatih Akin, 2004) and gained international fame with her role in the phenomenon series Game of Thrones. 

Hafsteinn Gunnar Sigurðsson, the director of Confort Nordic (2023), which opened last year's TIFF, is also part of this year's jury. He has a long history with the festival, this being his fourth time participating. 

Before becoming a renowned film producer, Konstantinos Kontovrakis was a film critic, festival programmer, and publicist. In recent years, he has produced and co-produced over 25 internationally acclaimed films such as How to Have Sex (dir. Molly Manning Walker, winner of the Un Certain Regard award at Cannes in 2023) and Triangle of Sadness (dir. Ruben Östlund, winner of the Palme d’Or at Cannes in 2022). 

Markéta Šantrochová worked for over eight years with the Programming Department of the Karlovy Vary Film Festival and is currently the head of the Czech Film Center, a division of the Czech Film Fund. In May 2019, she was appointed president of European Film Promotion. 

The TIFF.23 jury is completed by director Paul Negoescu, who directed several internationally awarded short films before debuting in feature film with A Month in Thailand, the winner of the Romanian debut award at TIFF in 2012. His filmography includes titles appreciated by both critics and audiences, such as Two Lottery Tickets and Men of Deeds, which won the most important awards at the Gopo Awards in 2023.

One of the members of the What’s Up, Doc? jury, which features ten films testing the conventions of documentary filmmaking, is Dana Bunescu, an editor and sound designer whose name is associated with the most important Romanian films of the last 20 years, from 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days to The Death of Mr. Lazarescu or Aferim!. For the film Ana, Mon Amour she received the Silver Bear for outstanding artistic contribution at the 2017 Berlinale. 

Mira Staleva is the general director of the Sofia Film Festival and also of Sofia Meetings, a co-production market within the festival focused on first or second-time directors. Among the most important titles in her filmography as a producer are two films directed by Jessica Woodworth and Peter Brosens: The King of the Belgians and The Barefoot Emperor. The first premiered at the Venice Film Festival, the second at the Toronto International Film Festival.

Film critic Giuseppe Gariazzo is a selector for the Trieste Film Festival and is part of the team of the Job Film Days Festival in Turin and the Med Film Festival in Rome. He has worked, among others, for the Turin Film Festival and the "Critics' Week" at the Venice International Film Festival.

Vera Mijojlić, a member of the jury that will designate the best feature film in the Romanian Days, is the founder of SEEfest in Los Angeles, the most important film festival promoting films from Eastern and Southeastern Europe in the USA. She has curated major film retrospectives for the UCLA Film & Television Archive and the Austin Film Society and initiated a national short film tour with Los Angeles Filmforum. 

Film programmer, researcher, and lecturer Yaara Ozery is a senior curator and part of the Selection Committee of the Haifa International Film Festival. At the same time, she teaches at the Steve Tisch School of Film and Television, Tel Aviv University, and at the Bezalel Academy of Arts and Design. Her main research interests are related to women's cinema and documentary cinema. 

The third member of the jury is Yorgos Krassakopoulos, a film journalist and founding member and chief programmer of the Athens International Film Festival. He founded the production company Playtime in the early 2000s, and since 1992 he has collaborated with the Thessaloniki Film Festival in various capacities, currently working as Head of Programming.

Artistic director of the international short film festival Bueu, Manuel Pena has directed three short films and a documentary, which have won awards including at TIFF. In 2021 he founded the production company Nortecatro Cinema, whose first project is Azul 91, his feature debut. 

Geraldine Bryant began her career in sales at Celluloid Dreams, after which she moved to Playtime. She is in charge of the Festivals, Filmmakers, and Materials department at The Bureau Sales. 

After many years spent as a manager in film exhibition and distribution, Fabio Tucci began to focus exclusively on international sales, and currently heads the Festivals department at True Colours and is part of the acquisitions team at the same company.

One of the members of the International Federation of Film Critics (FIPRESCI) jury at TIFF.23 is Wanda Bendjelloul, a film critic from Sweden, author, filmmaker, and TV producer with a background in news, who weekly reviews films for Sweden's largest morning newspaper, Dagens Nyheter, and for Swedish Channel 4.

Film critic and film programmer from Turkey, Nil Kural was the director of the Flying Broom International Women's Film Festival and has worked with the Istanbul International Film Festival. 

Nataliia Serebriakova is a film critic and writes for Ukrainian magazines such as Korydor.in.ua, DTF-Magazine, SKVOT, but also for Cineuropa.org and Cargo. She has been a member of the Union of Ukrainian Film Critics since 2018, program manager of the Scanorama Film Festival since 2022, and was a programmer for the Ukrainian Days at La Cinémathèque Française in 2022.

For the first time, the Transilvania International Film Festival has an Ecumenical Jury. One of the jury members is Ileana Bîrsan, a film critic and educator, co-founder of the DokStation Music Documentary Film Festival, and production coordinator at the company Wearebasca. In January 2024, she co-founded with other members of SIGNIS Romania, FILMIKON, an international festival presenting films awarded by ecumenical juries, where she also serves as festival director. 

Piet Halma has extensive experience in communication, public broadcasting, and peacekeeping activities. He has worked at the ecumenical television IKON in the Netherlands and PAX, an international peace organization that protects civilians from acts of war. He is a book and film critic for a Dutch daily newspaper. 

Tímea Kókai-Nagy worked at Budapest Film, the largest art cinema company in Hungary, and was the secretary of the Hungarian Art Cinema Association. She is currently head of the Communication Department at an art center based in Budapest, focused on culture. 

Film producer and director Edgar Rubio is head of the Communication Department for the National Dialogue for Peace in Mexico and former head of the Communication Department of SIGNIS. He has been a member of the SIGNIS Jury and the Ecumenical Jury at major film and television festivals worldwide.

Another new jury at TIFF is that of SIGNIS, a non-governmental organization comprising members from over one hundred countries. Among its members is Irina Margareta Nistor, a renowned film critic, known to the general public as "the voice of films" – during the communist period, she dubbed over 3,000 films recorded on videotape. For over 20 years, she has conceived and moderated the weekly radio show "The Voice of Films". She participates in Cine-concerts with silent films, to which she gives voice, including at TIFF. 

Elias Khlat is a producer and director from Lebanon, with extensive experience in advertising and media. In 2013, he founded the Tripoli Film Festival, bringing international films and guests to a city trying to recover from the wounds of war. He has been involved in creative design, animation, and post-production projects before founding a production company specializing in corporate and documentary films.

For the eleventh consecutive year, young Romanians and French, students in Cluj specializing in theater and film, medicine, or international cooperation, are part of the Young Francophone Jury. They will watch eight French-language films to award the TV5MONDE and French Institute Award. The prize consists of the acquisition of the film's broadcasting rights in Romanian cinemas. The mentor of this jury is Corina Șuteu, cultural consultant and former Minister of Culture. The five young people selected for the Young Francophone Jury at TIFF.23 are Andrada Moruțan, Cristina-Georgiana Sabou, Maïtena Houliat, Florence Devaux, and Ștefan-George Popa.