International Debut Feature Film Competition

After leaving school, Claudia Steffen went straight from her native Rostock to Berlin, joined Gemini Films in Cologne in 1994 and then specialised in international coproduction management. In 1998 she moved to Cologne production firm Pandora Film, became partner in 2005 and took over as managing director in 2012. Steffen produces feature films in cooperation with directors from all over the world. On her list of achievements spanning over 40 works are Gundermann (director: Andreas Dresen), High Life (director: Claire Denis), Layla Fourie (director: Pia Marais), and In My Room (director: Ulrich Köhler). Steffen considers herself, in film terms, an »enabler«. She regularly teaches seminars on film (co)production and is a member of ACE (Ateliers du Cinéma Européen) and the German Film Academy.

A native of Jena, Germany, Luise Wolfram first appeared on screen aged 7 in Helke Misselwitz’s film Engelchen. She trained at the University of Performing Arts Ernst Busch in Berlin and was an ensemble member of Berlin’s Schaubühne theatre until 2015. Wolfram has worked with several directors including Michael Thalheimer, Jossi Weiler, and Katie Mitchell, in whose internationally successful production of Miss Julie she played the leading role and was rewarded in Moscow with the Golden Mask theatre award. Among her recent cinema and TV appearances are Matilda as the last Russian Empress, Schubert in Love, Aenne Burda –Die Wirtschaftswunderfrau, Charité and Devotion. In 2020, Wolfram will reappear as forensics expert Linda Selb in the Bremen edition of German crime series Tatort.

María Paula Lorgia is a researcher and curator of film and media arts and holds a master’s degree in media studies from the New School University in New York City. She currently serves as the head programmer of the Cinematheque of Bogotá, the main public institution for cinema in Colombia. For the past six years she has also been coordinating Ciclo Rosa, the oldest Colombian LGBTIQ film festival.