I have been a film freak since I was an ugly little kid in the ugliest town in the world - Spentrup, one hour north of Ebeltoft. The psychological darkness of the place drove me into solid film abuse. Every day I rented a 30 kilo Beta-tape which I transported home on a specially designed trolley. On Wednesdays I had the permission of my parents (who knew I was about to explode from boredom) to watch both the 19.00 and 21.00 screenings at the local primitive plastic-chair-bad-sound-lousy-screen cinema. "Smokey and the bandit" at 19.00 and then " Alien" at 21.00. The later screening was always the best. Rambo, Indy Jones, Chuck Norris, Bruce Lee. I told my parents that both screenings were of the same film ("They just repeat it if someone missed the first screening"). Years later they told me that they knew I was lying all along. Since 1998 I have travelled the world with a film passport, interviewing every film star in the business, reporting about every phenomenon occurring and reviewing more than 200 new films a year. I have written books and screenplays, made fiction and documentary - portraits and Oscar coverage. Film with film and film on top of film. I joined the EFC in August 2007. I love the place and I'm sure I have the best job in the world. Just ahead of Quentin Tarantino's and Martin Scorsese's job, bien sur. And David Lynch's. Not to mention Lars von Trier's. Plus Steven Spielberg's. And of course Charlie Kaufmann's. Also Anders Thomas Jensen's and actually loads of others whom I'm sure would love to be the Principal of EFC if they only got the chance...

Swedish
I grew up in Sweden, Hungary and Spain before I moved to California where my career in film took its beginning. I started by serving coffee, driving the actors around, moved up to assist in sound production and to assist the director. Without any formal education, I moved through all areas of film making. Out of curiosity and interest I have since then had the luck to work with a broad variety of both media and genres – my aim has always been to reach out to the audience whether in feature films, theatre productions, operas, TV-series, music videos or commercials. Based on my love to music I have directed almost a dozen of operas in both Sweden and Germany, and also music videos for various artists including Eric Gadd from Sweden. Moving on to the TV-media I have been the director and producer of several documentaries, series and shows, many of them sold to TV-stations around the world. My feature filmography as a director includes “Against The Odds”, “Hassel – There is no Mercy”, “Dream” and the production of four feature films about “Lilla Jönssonligan”. In the documentary area I recently did “I saw the murder of Olof Palme” and “The Stockholm Syndrome”, both highly controversial documentaries.

Canadian
As a filmmaker, I discovered that documentary film making offers limitless ways of getting into real cinema. The way I have been working is miles away from manipulating the images in order to prove an argument. Life itself is there, everywhere, in the people’s eyes, faces, simple behaviours or ways they interact together. The tyranny of the imagination is frequently killing the essence of film which is for me about capturing the truth, the beauty or the horror of reality. The other enemy is often the artist’s ego who desperately wants to express himself while he has the possibility to express the world. Documentary filmmaking enables capturing the infinite complexity of the world by the means of simplicity: letting things happen, capturing them with one’s sensitive and intuitive eyes, and then writing the film you want, honestly, with the material you got. I am not against other kinds of approach, in the contrary, I like to discuss and debate about cinema.
I shot my last film, How Can You Tell If the Little Fish are Happy? in China. By following the simple life of an old retired man, hairdressers, and young girls selling crappy stuff on the streets, many aspects of modern China are revealed. But first, we didn’t want it to be anthropologic. We wanted the film to be very atmospheric, as any good film is. The film will be released in the fall in Canada. My other feature length documentary is partially taking place in the projects of Paris during the 2005 riots. It puts into contrast the life of these kids from the fringes and the life and ideas of Alain Touraine, a famous sociologist who lives in the center of Paris. My newest project is a feature fiction about young people experiencing in their own ways impossible love.

American
I grew up near Boston, in an area noted for its writers (Thoreau, Emerson, Alcott, Hawthorne) and an appreciation of literature was instilled in me early on. I studied English at Rollins College in Winter Park, Florida and filmmaking at Ithaca College in upstate New York. After graduating I spent a year in the former Danish island of St. Thomas in the US Virgin Islands, then returned north to write a humour column for a Boston newspaper. In the early 1990s I moved to Los Angeles, where I wrote over 15 screenplays and worked in development for a variety of film and television production companies, including Centropolis (Independence Day, The Patriot) and Carsey-Werner (Cosby Show, Roseanne, etc). I also worked for a production company that specialized in Australian authors, helping them adapt their work for the screen. In 2000 I and my Danish wife moved to Denmark and since then I have taught scriptwriting at the European Film College.

Irish
Born in London, I was brought up in Canada and Ireland. I studied French and Archaeology at Trinity College Dublin and upon graduating spent many years travelling the world and working at a variety of jobs including waitress, nanny and English teacher. I completed a City & Guilds Certificate in Video Production and started my career in production working in comedy drama at The Paramount Comedy Channel in London where I worked with up and coming talent Sacha Baron Cohen. I then moved into children’s television and from there worked on short films, music shows, reality, topical magazine programmes and live multi camera OB’s. For the past three years I have been working in New York on a variety of programming including an epic drama documentary series for The Discovery Channel.

Danish
Originally trained as an electrician, I later graduated as an electronics engineer from the Technical Institute of Copenhagen. In 1972 I joined Scandinavian Airlines to work with navigational and communication equipment in aeroplanes. In the mid-seventies I joined a trans-Pacific expedition as the radio operator, diver and navigator aboard a replica of a 2000-year-old Chinese junk, and was camera assistant and sound engineer on a BBC documentary about the expedition. From 1978 to 1993 I travelled worldwide as senior technical consultant and lecturer in computerised equipment at Radiometer International Ltd., and produced and edited the company’s instruction and promotion videos. In 1995 I was given a grant by Nordisk Film to develop the ‘gyrocam’, a gyrostablised camera system designed for steady filming from moving vehicles, and set up a company specialising in aerial filming. The company has been involved in a number of feature films and numerous commercials, working with directors such as Nils Malmros, Lars Von Trier, Morten Arnfred and Peter Flint. I have taught editing and audio-visual techniques at the European Film College since 1993.

Danish
I was born in Arad in the Western Transylvanian region of Romania and graduated in Cinematography from the Institute of Theatrical and Cinematographic Arts, Bucharest (1983) and in languages from the University of Bucharest (1990). After completing my film studies I worked for seven years for the Motion Picture Studio in Buftea, Romania, participating in the production of twelve features, eight documentaries and various commercials, instruction and corporate films, while working simultaneously as a freelance journalist. I have taught cinematography at the European Film College since 1994. I am a member of the Dansk Filmfotograf Forbund (Danish Association of Cinematographers) and a member of the Board of FAF (the Union of Danish Film Workers).

Danish
I have worked with TV for most of my life. In 1976 I started working for the public Danish television company, Danmarks Radio. I began as a producer assistant and later on TV producer. In the middle of the 80's I took a leave from the TV-business and traveled to Kenya, where I worked for a German organization working with refugees. I stayed there for 3 ½ years.
I am very interested in culture and have always tried to combine this with my work. As a result I have a lot of experience with cultural programs - both small music programs and large shows and quiz-programs. I have produced cultural reportages from small and large stages all over Denmark and this means I have a well functioning network within Danish cultural life. During my years as TV producer I have worked within all fields of multi-camera production. Consequently I know how to work with cameras in different ways - whether in a live quiz program, in OB productions or in a game show produced live-to-tape in the studio.
In my opinion it is the intensity, the cooperation, coordination and the matter of capturing content, picture and sound to form an entity which makes TV- and film work unique and exciting.