BIO

BIO / DIRECTOR / AWARDS & SELECTIONS / PRODUCER / PRESS & REVIEWS / CONTACT

Dea Gjinovci is a Swiss-Albanian director and producer. Her films have premiered in prestigious international film festivals Tribeca Film Festival, Visions du Réel, IDFA, CPH:DOX, Hot Docs, DocNYC, Winterthur KurzFilmTage and many others... She is a Sundance alumna, a 2019 Film Independent Fellow and more recently participated in a residency at UnionDocs in NYC. Her cinematographic style blends poetic narration, magical realism and cinéma vérité. She won several awards including "Best National Film" at 2017 Dokufest, "Best new Talent" mentions at both ZagrebDox 2021 and Biografilm 2020. She is a member of the Swiss Film Academy since her "Best Documentary" nomination for Wake Up on Mars in 2022. Dea has held masterclasses and lectures at NYU-AbuDhabi, University of Geneva, Centro Frantz Fanon in Torino, Neo School in Prishtina and Dokufest Film school in Prizren. She has a BA(Hons) in Economics and Politics from SOAS, University of London and a MA in Ethnographic and documentary film from UCL, University of London. She speaks four languages: French, English, Italian and Albanian.

DIRECTOR

ODA

IN DEVELOPMENT

Réveil sur Mars

2020

Sans le Kosovo

2017

Dust Away

2022

Feature docu-fiction «ODA»

Directed by Dea Gjinovci

Produced by Astrae Productions and Haut et Court Doc

Supported by BAK (Switzerland) and la Ville de Genève

Short Animated Documentary «Dust Away» (11')

Directed by Tanita Rahmani and Dea Gjinovci

-UnionDocs Collaborative Studio 2021/22 (NYC)

World Premiere: Winterthur KurzFilmTage 2022

International Premiere: IDFA 2022

NA Premiere: DocNYC 2022

Feature documentary «Réveil sur Mars» (74')

Directed by Dea Gjinovci

Produced by Astrae Productions, Mélisande Films (France), Alva Film (Switzerland) in association with Amok Films

Executive produced by Heidi Fleisher and XTR

Co-produced by Radio Télévision Suisse & France Télévision.
"Wake Up on Mars" was awarded Sundance Documentary Fund grants

Short documentary «Sans le Kosovo» (23')

Writing, directing and editing

Produced in UK

Shooting locations: Italy, Croatia & Kosovo

AWARDS &
SELECTIONS

Réveil sur Mars

Sans le Kosovo

World Premiere at Tribeca Film Festival 2020
European Premiere at Visions du Réel 2020
Awarded special Mention for Best New Talent at Biografilm 2020
Awarded special mention for Best New Talent at ZagrebDox 2021
Winner of the "Perspective d'un doc" award at Visions du Réel 2018 organized by Radio Télévision Suisse
Awarded Impact Day Pitch Award at FIFDH 2019
Nominated for "Prix de Soleure" and "Opera Prima" at Solothurner Tage 2020
Selected and presented in more than forty festivals internationally
Nominated for "Best Documentary" at the Swiss Film Awards 2022

Best National Film Award, Dokufest, Kosovo, August 2017
Winner of «L’Institut français» Prize, Festival Cine Zaragoza, December 2017
Third Prize in the professional filmmaker category, Global Migration Film Festival, December 2017
Global Migration Film Festival, December 2017
This Human World, International Human Rights Film Festival, Vienna, December 2017
Sole Luna Documentary Festival in Palermo, July 2017 and Treviso, September 2017
Seanema Film Festival, Ulcinj, Montenegro, September 2017
Paris Short Film Festival, Paris, May 2017
International Film Market and Media Library, Visions of the Real, Nyon, April 2017
Sheffield Festival’s Doc / Player, June 2017