Jury

Caroline Libresco is a leading film curator, producer, and creative executive who spent over 18 years as a Senior Programmer at the Sundance Film Festival. She led the Sundance Women’s Program and was the founding director of Sundance Catalyst, raising $33 million for films such as The Truffle Hunters, Writing with Fire, and The Witch. As Co-Founder and Head of Granting at Jewish Story Partners, she has awarded $4.5M to 120 projects, including the Oscar-shortlisted Last Flight Home and A Still Small Voice. Her production credits include Food and Country, Disclosure, and American Revolutionary: The Evolution of Grace Lee Boggs. An AMPAS member, Caroline serves as a story consultant and strategic advisor.

Farhad Ahmed Dehlvi is an Indian cinematographer based in Los Angeles. Born and raised in New Delhi, he discovered the power of visual storytelling through a childhood photography class. He believes in the affirmative potential of narrative film to foster compassion and empathy by capturing the world through a protagonist’s eyes. His work on Please Hold earned a 2022 Academy Award nomination for Best Live Action Short, while Green won the Grand Jury Award at the 2019 Sundance Film Festival. Farhad’s feature credits include Take Me Home (Sundance and Berlinale 2026), Women Is Losers (SXSW 2021), and Vishal Bhardwaj’s Khufiya. He has also lensed commercial spots for Amazon and Google. As an immigrant, he brings a unique perspective to his craft, specializing in the unspoken relationships of daily life.

Juan Pablo González is a filmmaker whose work spans fiction and nonfiction, largely set in his hometown of Atotonilco el Alto. His debut feature, Dos Estaciones, received the Special Jury Award for Acting at the Sundance Film Festival. Earlier accolades include the Slamdance Grand Jury Prize for The Solitude of Memory and the New Orleans Film Festival Grand Jury Prize for La espera. A 2024 Guggenheim and 2025 Creative Capital Fellow, Juan Pablo was also awarded the 2021 Vilcek Prize for Creative Promise. His diverse portfolio, including the documentary Caballerango, has been showcased at MoMA, IDFA, and the San Sebastián International Film Festival. Named one of Filmmaker Magazine’s “25 New Faces of Independent Film,” he was honored with the 2022 True Vision Award.

Malin Kan is a Los Angeles-based film curator with over a decade of experience in festival programming and program management. As Director of European Languages and Movies in America (ELMA), she leads a nonprofit foundation partnering with film festivals, consulates, and cultural organizations to bring European cinema to Los Angeles. Previously, she served as Senior Programmer of Feature Films at AFI FEST, where she helped shape the voice of the festival from 2016 to 2025. Malin’s curatorial approach integrates film history and archival preservation to expan the international canon and foster cultural dialogue through film. She holds a BA in Film and Media Studies from UC Berkeley and an MA in Moving Image Archive Studies from UCLA. She has contributed writing to film publications and has served on juries and selection committees for festivals and granting bodies nationwide. 

Alisha Tejpal is an Indian filmmaker whose practice spans fiction and non-fiction, exploring the intersection of anonymity and intimacy in urban landscapes. Her work investigates the invisible social, political, and economic structures that govern quotidian life. Her films have screened at Sundance, Rotterdam, and San Sebastián. Her first short, Lata, won Best International Short at the Leeds International Film Festival and was acquired by Mubi and The Criterion Channel. Her follow-up, Landscapes of Longing, premiered at IFFR and was featured in the 2025 New Directors/New Films showcase at MoMA. Developing her first feature, For the Eyes are Blind to the Stairwells, Alisha’s work is supported by the MacDowell Fellowship, Film at Lincoln Center’s Artist Academy, the Sundance Institute, and the Points North Institute. She holds an MFA in Film Directing from CalArts.

Apoorva Charan is an Los Angeles-based producer whose feature debut, Joyland, won the Un Certain Regard Jury Prize at Cannes and Best International Film at the Independent Spirit Awards. The film was Pakistan’s first to make the Oscar shortlist. Her second feature, Take Me Home, won the $1 million AT&T Untold Stories award and premiered at Sundance 2026, where Charan received the Amazon MGM Fiction Producer’s Award. A Columbia University MFA alumna and former Adjunct Professor, Charan has produced over 20 award-winning shorts. Her extensive fellowship history includes Sundance, Film Independent, and BAFTA Breakthrough. She previously worked in development at Walt Disney Studios and Big Beach.