Scott Blum

Scott has a passion for enjoying films of all sorts in particular those with “a message that makes him ponder and think”. His involvement in the Hague Global Cinema Festival is as a film-goer and he is mightily impressed by the innovation and the sheer quality of all of the films that are submitted.

Scott has lived and worked overseas, he has travelled extensively, and now resides in the UK where he is enjoying life.

Keyuri Shah

She is a known Bollywood actress based in Mumbai with around 2 dozen films to her credit. She started as a theater artiste and has done many short films, commercials, fashion modelling for many brands and print shoots. She has acted as a lead actress  in a number of regional language feature films in India.

Sunita Rajvanshi

A Mathematician with a degree from IIT, Roorkee, India and a Mixed Media Artist. With a passion for art, she attained a diploma in Fine Arts from Raja Mansingh Tomar Music & Arts University, India and has participated in various art exhibitions across India, Middle East and Europe for charity purposes. She loves to watch all types of films and is a passionate critique. She also believes that movies shape our lives.

Follow her on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and YouTube : @SunRajArts

Marianna Giacomel

She was born and lived in Italy where she studied foreign literature. In 2018 she moved to The Hague with her family. Lover of reading, visual arts and music, especially jazz. “Working for The Hague Global Cinema Festival and Alwar International Film Festival gives me the opportunity to combine my passion for films with being part of a team in an environment that highlights the multiculturalism, a characteristic of The Hague, the city where I chose to live and where I want to play an active role.”

Irfan Jaami

He is a Bollywood Director with around 15 years’ experience of directing over 100 projects of a variety of genres. Projects range from TV commercials , Tele-films , Tele-series , Video spots , Corporate Films, documentaries to independent short films. He has also penned down Lyrics for an international Album ‘ Colours of peace ‘ .

Kamalika

A versatile internationally recognised singer, artist and anchor

She is a creative artist, singer, anchor, performer, actress, model for the last 20 years. Performed on stage and TV shows spanning across music, theatre, debate, quiz, dance, modelling and anchoring shows in various countries. She is a versatile vocal artist of Classical, Bollywood and Western genres of Blues, Jazz, Pop, Soul, Soft Rock. Trained in Indian classical music under Late Vidusi Srimati Shipra Bose, known as Bengal’s Begum Akhtar. Trained in Western vocal music under Teiron Jones. Kamalika has given stellar music performances at various prestigious clubs and events across Kolkata, Muscat, and Bangalore including at Hard Rock Cafe Bangalore with her Blues Jazz band Divergent Notes. She performed in Hindi, Bengali and English for various community cultural programmes in  different countries. Anchored shows for famous Bollywood music directors like Pritam, Shankar Ehsaan Loy, Imran Khan Badshaah, and a number of high profile corporate events while in Oman, Muscat at prestigious venues. She has hosted and performed Bollywood music for international film festivals like Alwar International film festival and many others in Doha, Kolkata, Bangalore, Muscat. She has also written, directed and acted in plays in Bengali, and acted in several other English drama productions. She has also given contemporary dance performances abroad and in India at various cultural events. She also writes poetry and does recitation as part of her other interests as well.

Willemijn Mignot

Willemijn is a film producer and (script) writer. Her first book, the road novel Lijndansen, was recently published. She has always had a strong interest in people, stories, music and drama. But it was only after her law studies, three children, many moves and teaching Dutch in high school and as a volunteer for refugee mothers that she decided to write stories again. In 2016 she started screenwriting training at the Script Academy, where she met her writing colleague Sarif Tribou. After graduating, they decided to unite to further develop their ideas, stories and knowledge, resulting in the production of the short film Bibi’s Breakfast, written by Willemijn and directed by Sarif. What fascinates and inspires her are the fine lines that connect people. Patterns and the underlying motivations of people. Incomprehensible choices. Their quest to get out of oppressive frames.

Sarif Tribou

SARIF TRIBOU (49) is a director, conductor and screenwriter involved in film, music theater and art in the broadest sense of the word. Originally educated as a classical percussionist and drummer, his interest was quickly aroused by storytelling in general and how music has so much in common with it. His compositions became stories and vice versa. After completing his study at the conservatory, he studied scriptwriting at ScriptAcademy, while he as a music theater maker, continued to develop his artistic signature with large-scale projects such as the theatrical opening of the Hubertus tunnel in The Hague. In corona time he directed the film Bibi’s Breakfast, an empathetic drama about the relationship between a father and his grownup, mentally unstable daughter. At this moment, Sarif together with co-writer/producer Willemijn Mignot works on developing the dark colored Nerderhorror series concept FREAKS, and the historical thriller HULSEBOSCH, based on the live of the illustrious and infamous Dutch criminologist from Amsterdam.

Eiko Jin

With her passion for film music, Eiko moved to the US to pursue her composer dream in 2014. The international background offered her different perspectives to understand film and music which enriched her composition in return. She’s an active member of The American Society of Music Arrangers and Composers and a voting member of The Society of Composers and Lyricists. She paints her music world with not only instruments but also her ethnic style vocal performance. Joining the team of The Hague Global Cinema Festival is a true honor and the brightest glow of her expanding professional records.

Sonu Shiva

She is an Associate Professor of English in Dungar College, Bikaner, India. She has 25 yrs of teaching and research experience. She is a film critic and has traveled to Europe and Southeast Asia to deliver lectures. She has done a language assessment course from the University of Maryland and Baltimore County. Eleven scholars have completed PhD under her supervision. Her areas of interest are ELT, Diasporic literature, Film studies, gender studies.

Rogier van Beeck Calkoen

Rogier van Beeck Calkoen (writer, director) has trained in Prague, Italy and Los Angeles. He directed the award winning short “24/7 Fitness Club: set in nighttime Prague, the incredible World War II story “The Storykeeper”, shortlisted for the Hot Springs Documentary Award, and the documentary of the Czech Puppet master, Pavel Trülar. Last year he produced and directed in Málaga “Andersen and the Jinn”, leading the short film from an emerging script idea through post-production to festivals and distribution. Andersen and the Jinn won several awards at Film Festivals all over the world. Currently working on his new feature film called The Life Coach.

James Fitzmaurice

James Fitzmauric is an emeritus professor of English at Northern Arizona University and an Honorary Research Fellow at the University of Sheffield. He has won numerous screenwriting awards at film festivals, and had two scripts produced. He continues to write and edit in the world of academe, as with his co-edited collection for Amsterdam University Press – Authorizing Early Modern European Women (2022).

Gijs van Beeck Calkoen

Gijs is the founder of the Practice for Bold Thinking that facilitates teams to design ideas for innovations, both technical and socio-cultural. To this end, he applies well-considered and structured thinking techniques, such as lateral thinking and TRIZ, the Russian acronym for the Theory of Inventive Thinking. He started Malaga Ideathons which brings together digital nomads to develop solid ideas for startups. He sailed in the Royal Netherlands Navy in various technical positions, including as the Chief Engineer aboard an oceanographer. At the Defense Academy he taught and supervised promising officers in their management training. His last position was Director of Naval Research.

Barbara McVeigh

Barbara lives in Northern California and works as both a teacher for young children and as a documentary film producer and media artist. She has had the joy of creating film projects with legacy international artists, storytellers, and activists, understanding that stories and the arts are the vessels to share our collective humanity and build resilience, empathy, and understanding between us all.

Willem Handels

Willem Handels is a connoisseur of art, well read and well traveled person. He lives in The Hague. He has great interest in literature and art cinema. Great and well developed interest in music of many origins and classical and modern dance in it’s widest sense.

Martijn de Man

Martijn de Man started his professional music career as a keyboard player for the Dutch rock band Urban Heroes. With them he recorded the album ‘Innerdream’ for Sony Records in 1994 and in the same year also performed with them on Parkpop, the largest free concert festival in Europe. Although Martijn enjoyed performing live, he developed a greater interest in music composition & sound design for film and became a fulltime composer in 1995. Highlights include scores for the documentaries ‘Oude Bomen’ and ‘We zien ons’ for Dutch television as well as immersive soundscapes for Ferrari: Under the Skin, van Gogh Museum and Dunhuang Caves. He is also the inhouse composer/sound designer at MCW Creative Agency in Rotterdam.

Algis Thomas Kemezys

Algis Kemezys is a seasoned image maker both in still photography and cinematography. His photography has been exhibited worldwide while his mostly-documentary videos have played in International Film Festivals and won prizes.

Avnish Rajvanshi

“An Oil/Gas Producer by Profession and A Filmmaker by Passion”

From the oil production fields of Middle East and Europe, Avnish Rajvanshi ventured into the field of filmmaking with his first film ‘The Kingmaker of the Mughal Empire’ which won international awards and accolades. With three more film production projects in the pipeline, he is also organising film festivals in The Netherlands, United Kingdom, United States, Malaysia and India. As the Festival Director of this event, his vision is to encourage, identify and showcase talent from the crowd and to support production value over budget.

Additional Background: With a distinguished career behind with majors like Shell International, he holds a Ph.D. from Indian Institute of Technology IIT(ISM), India, with management certification from Queensland University of Technology, Australia; Delft University of Technology, The Netherlands; Cranfield School of Management, United Kingdom; University of Texas at Austin, United States and Shell Project Academy, The Netherlands.

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