Make Some Noise: Spotlighting New Voices in Cinema

Meryam Joobeur is a Tunisian-Canadian filmmaker. Her debut feature "Mé el Aïn" premiered in Competition at the 2024 Berlinale, winning 12 awards, including Best Director at HKIFF and the Grand Prize at Taipei IFF. Her short "Brotherhood" (2018) won Best Canadian Short at TIFF, was Oscar-nominated, and received 78 awards. She previously directed "Gods, Weeds and Revolutions" (2012) and "Born in the Maelstrom" (2017). She is also an alumna of the Berlinale Talents Lab from the 2015 edition.

María Zamora has produced over 20 feature films, including "Mapa" (2012) by León Siminiani, "Libertad" (Cannes, 2021) by Clara Roquet, and Carla Simón's "Summer 1993" (Berlinale Generation 2017). With her company Elastica Films (founded in 2021), she produced the Golden Bear winner "Alcarràs" (2022), also nominated for the European Film Award. Her recent productions include "Matria" (Berlinale Panorama 2023), "Creatura" (Cannes Directors’ Fortnight 2023), "The Rye Horn" (San Sebastián winner 2023), and "Mothers Don’t" (Locarno 2024). She is currently in the post-production of Simón's new film "Romería".

Aïssa Maïga has worked as an actress with renowned directors like Michael Haneke ("Hidden", 2005), Cédric Klapisch ("Russian Dolls", 2005), and Michel Gondry ("Mood Indigo", 2013). Born in Dakar and based in Paris, she starred in Alain Gomis’ "Tey" (2012), which screened in Berlinale Competition, and earned a César nomination for "Bamako" (2006). She appeared in "The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind" (2019), which also screened at the Berlinale. As a director, her documentary "Above Water" premiered in Cannes (2021). She stars in "Marie & Jolie", Erige Sehiri’s follow-up to "Under the Fig Trees".

Aida Baghernejad is an award winning culture critic based in Berlin. Her work has been published in various national and international media outlets such as DLF Kultur or The Guardian, and focuses on popular culture and its intersections with the political. Last summer, she spent five months in the US as a Thomas Mann Fellow to investigate the intersections between pop culture and the political sphere. She usually lives in Berlin, sometimes in London, but mostly on the internet.