AFFF 2006 Jury Members

Ms Cecilia Yip

Cecilia Yip is one of the most common names in the HK film industry. She has worked in more than 45 feature films to date, and in addition to her films, she has extended her talents on television performances in Hong Kong, Taiwan and the P.R.C.

She has been nominated numerous times for the Hong Kong Film awards, and won many times as well. She has also been nominated in the 27th Golden Horse Award for her role in ‘This Thing Call Love’ and in the 30th Taiwan Golden Bell Best Actress Award for her performance in the television series ‘Heaven Sword Versus Dragon Sabre’. She has also ventured, and effectively reinterpreted her acting skills in theatre, with lead roles in four stage plays in Hong Kong; ‘Les Liaisons Dangereuses’, ‘The Wilderness’, ‘Magic Is The Moonlight’ and ‘The End of Love Generation’.

J.V. Hart started producing independent films in the 1970’s soon after graduating from SMU in Dallas. His writing/producing credits include; Hook, directed by Steven Spielberg, Bram Stoker’s Dracula, directed by Francis Ford Coppola, Muppet Treasure Island & Jack And The Beanstalk: The Real Story, directed by Brian Henson, Contact, directed by Robert Zemeckis, Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, directed by Kenneth Branagh as producer with Coppola and John Veitch, , also directed by Brian Henson, a Jim Henson/CBS mini-series, Tuck Everlasting, directed by Jay Russell for Disney.

J.V. has been nominated for the Humanitas Prize as screenwriter on Carl Sagan’s Contact, which also won the HUGO award, and received the Academy of Science Fiction, Fantasy and Horror Films Saturn Award for best Screenplay for Bram Stoker’s Dracula. His production of Jack And The Beanstalk: The Real Story also received the Saturn Award from the Academy of Science Fiction for best mini-series in 2001.

Mr James V Hart

Mr Ketan Mehta

Ketan graduated in film direction from Film and Television Institute of India and has eight feature films, seven documentaries and a television serial to his credit. Ketan's very first film Bhavni Bhavai won him instant acclaim. His movies have been selected for various international film festivals such as Nantes (France) and the Moscow Film Festival, where his movies have won numerous awards over the years. Mirch Masala was one of Ketan Mehta's triumphant efforts which won him the Best Film Award at Hawaii. It was released to 52 cinemas in the United States. Ketan Mehta has also had the honour of serving as a member of the Jury in various national and international film festivals. At present he is working on two films, both set in contemporary India. One is an Indian romance and the other a murder thriller. He did a biopic Sardar, on the life of Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel. Another famous Mehta film is Maya Memsaab. The Rising, his most recent directorial venture with English and Hindi (Mangal Pandey - the film) versions is a fictionalised account of the 1857 revolt and stars Aamir Khan in the role of Mangal Pandey.

Michael Yorke is a filmmaker, photographer, writer and anthropologist. He has made 24 documentaries for television and won many awards including the San Francisco Golden Gate Award, two Royal Television Society awards, a BAFTA nomination, the UN Environmental Award, the National Geographic Earthwatch Award, and the BBC Asia Award. As an academic anthropologist and a documentary filmmaker, his focus has been to educate and inform viewers on the value of other cultures’ knowledge heritage. He has recently lectured in Visual Anthropology at the LSE, SOAS, Oxford University, Goldsmiths College and Manchester University Granada Centre for Visual Anthropology, and is a member the Royal Anthropological Institute Film Committee. He is currently Director of the Oxford Academy of Documentary Film, running film making workshops at universities worldwide.

Mr Micheal Yorke

Mr Volker Langhoff

Among this German Director of Photography's long list of credits are: the 1993 film Estelle, the 2001 B-52 (2001), and Uprising '89, Dresden, which won the Golden Dove award in the International Week of Documentaries and Short Films in Leipzig. His film education is just as extensive. In 1994, Langhoff graduated Master of Fine Arts (MFA) from HFF Potsdam-Babelsberg, and in 1996, he completed another MFA, this time from the California Institute of the Arts (CALARTS), Filmschool. Langhoff acquired a special internship in photography with John Bailey, ASC and Laszlo Kovacs, ASC for the movie As Good as it Gets (Jack Nicholson, Helen Hunt, Cuba Gooding, Jr.), and with Harold Ramis for Multiplicity, starring Michael Keaton and Andie MacDowell. Just as impressive is his scholarship with the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (A.M.P.A.S.), the award-giving body responsible for the Oscars.