Jury 2019

Judy Gladstone

Judy Gladstone is thrilled to continue working with excellent and innovative artists in Canada. Gladstone ran a CIDA (Canadian International Development Agency) program in Gaza, the West Bank and Israel, served as Cultural Attaché at the Embassy of Canada in Israel / Palestinian Territories and was the Executive Director of Bravo!FACT (Foundation to Assist Canadian Talent) for 15 years. While at Bravo!FACT, she commissioned thousands of short-form film and video projects from across the country.

Gladstone’s commitment to identifying talent and innovative ways to exhibit screen work gained her a Crystal Award for Outstanding Achievement (WIFT), a Leadership Award from Women in Communication Canada and a Maverick Award from the Female Eye Film Festival. Gladstone has been invited to speak at industry events around the world such as the St. John’s International Women’s Film Festival, Dance on Film (Lincoln Centre, NYC), the Banff Centre, Mobile World Congress (Barcelona), and the Film Forum (Paris). The works she commissioned were celebrated at Canadian and international film festivals with acknowledgements including a Prix de Jury de Cannes and an Academy Award nomination.

Roni Shalev

Roni Shalev is a writer and animator born in Jerusalem in 1993. She studied literature and creative writing at Bard College Berlin and is currently a student at the Bezalel Academy of Art. Her work focusses on displacement, belonging, and familial relationships. She finds inspiration on public transportation.

Luc Chamberland

Luc Chamberland is a multi-award winning film maker. A native of Montreal he work and lived for 20 years in Paris, Madrid, Berlin, Budapest and other cultured inspiring hotspots. Based primarily in London England, Luc animated and directed countless commercials in all styles and mediums of animation. He was he animator -director for Hollywood productions working for Spielbergs productions and Warner Brothers . Luc was animation director for the Dreamworks feature film ”Joseph the King of Dreams”.

Recently Luc created a series of short films with The National Film Board of Canada with his latest feature award winning film ”Seth’s Dominion”.

Luc loves film making always exploring news medium and styles inspired by the entire history of cinema and new digital arts.

Matt Zimbel

Matt Zimbel is an award winning writer, producer, musician, artistic director, radio and tv host and documentary film maker. Recent work of note includes Artistic Direction of the Canadian Songwriters Hall of Fame Gala honouring Neil Young, Bruce Cockburn, Beau Dommage, and Stephen Venne at a sold out Massey Hall in Toronto. In summer of 2018 Zimbel was the senior producer of the Netflix Series Comedians of the World (Canada, France, Quebec) and in 2015 was Senior Producer for the opening and closings of the Pan Am Games for the Host Broadcaster CBC in association with Cirque du Soleil.

For the past 40 years Zimbel has led the Juno award winning world jazz 9 piece band Manteca. The group has toured festivals around the world and shared stages with Miles Davis, Weather Report, Van Morrison and Ella Fitzgerald. Manteca is currently in studio with their 13 th release “Augmented Indifference”.

His most recent documentary “Zimbelism” (Dist. NFB) on the subject of his photographer father George Zimbel has screened around the world and most recently had its UK premiere at the Raindance Film Festival in London in October 2018.

He is currently writing a satirical book about Canadian Immigration for publication in the fall of 2020. Matt Zimbel was born in Tarrytown, New York and currently lives in Montreal, Canada. He has two sons, restauranteur Oliver Zimbel and musician, singer-songwriter Lucas Zimbel.