2016 Youth, Animation, Documentary International Jury

Chris Fujiwara is a film critic and programmer, born in New York. He has written several books on cinema, including Jacques Tourneur: The Cinema of Nightfall, The World and Its Double: The Life and Work of Otto Preminger, and Jerry Lewis. He also edited the book Defining Moments in Movies. He has contributed to numerous anthologies and journals and was the editor of Undercurrent, the film-criticism magazine of FIPRESCI (International Federation of Film Critics).

He has lectured on film aesthetics and film history at Tokyo University, Yale University, Rhode Island School of Design, and elsewhere. He was formerly Artistic Director of Edinburgh International Film Festival, and he has also developed film programs for Athénée Français Cultural Center (Tokyo), Jeonju International Film Festival, Sydney Film Festival, Mar del Plata Film Festival, and other institutions. He is one of the founders of the Film Criticism Collective, in collaboration with the Yamagata International Documentary Film Festival, and has organised or served as a mentor for film criticism workshops at the Berlinale, Melbourne International Film Festival, the International Film Festival of Kerala, and elsewhere.

As a member of the European Film Academy (EFA), renowned Swiss writer and director Christoph Schaub’s appointment highlights the important alliance between the APSA Academy and the EFA, established in 2011. Schaub has directed 18 documentaries and 10 feature films, which have screened to wide festival acclaim and seen him nominated for the Swiss Film Prize five times. Schaub’s fascinating documentaries have a particular focus on architectural and urban themes.

His feature documentary in the Asia Pacific region, Bird’s Nest – Herzog & de Meuron in China (2008), follows two Swiss star architects on two very different projects: the national stadium for the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing and an entire district in the provincial town of Jinhua, China. The documentary follows architects Jacques Herzog and Pierre de Meuron who, with artist Ai Weiwei as their general adviser and so-called ‘cultural interpreter’, literally build bridges between two cultures, two architectural traditions and two political systems. Schaub’s most recent documentary, Millions Can Walk, is the story of the 2012 month-long walk across India by many of its poorest people; the Jan Satyagraha, meaning March for Righteousness, which began on the anniversary of Gandhi’s birthday, October 2. Christoph Schaub has served on many juries including the 7th APSA International Jury in 2013.

A true lover of the arts, Nira Benegal contributes to and supports a diverse range of artistic disciplines including film, literature, music, architecture and design. Born in Lahore in 1939, Benegal attended the American boarding school Woodstock in the Himalayas, and later completed her BA Honours in History at the University of Delhi. Benegal had a long and successful career as an editor for the leading publisher of children’s books, India Book House. She later joined Inside Outside, India’s first and foremost design magazine, as Assistant Editor where she remained for the first three years of its publication. Currently, Benegal is a member of the Film Selection Committee for the Mumbai Film Festival. She is also a member of the Managing Committee of the Mehli Mehta Music Foundation, a not-for-profit organisation that promotes western classical music through the presentation of high-quality concerts and music education for children. Recently she volunteered to help with the annual Tata Literature Live Festival, Mumbai’s largest international literature festival.