June 2026 in Arezzo
Adeliza Backus-Pace
Adeliza Jane, born, raised, and living in New Mexico, has worked almost a decade in the film industry—both on set as an assistant prop master, and off set as a film festival projectionist. Inspired by the filmmakers she’s supported and the films she projects, Adeliza began channeling her love of cinema inward and onto the page. The spark for storytelling turned flame through screenwriting; she has written short films, a TV pilot, and spec commercials. She honed her directing skills collaborating on music videos with her folk-musician bestie, Jude Brothers, and recently directed her own short film, Acapulco—which, fittingly, may soon be projected by her at festivals. Adeliza is thrilled to have the opportunity to keep her writer’s fire kindled alongside her extracurricular passion for photography at the Nostos Screenwriting Retreat this summer.
Claire Leona Apps
Claire Leona Apps is a British-Canadian award-winning writer/director raised in Hong Kong and educated at the London Film School. Rooted in folklore and mystery, Apps's work interrogates society tensions and generational trauma. Her debut feature, And Then I Was French (2018), is a psychological thriller that subverts the romance narrative into a whimsical yet violent take on obsession. Her writing and directing credits include the Arts Council commissioned Girl Blue Running Shoe, Gweipo, Ruminate, and Ages of Man. Her work has aired on the BBC, been shown at the Great North Museum, and premiered at festivals including St. Louis, Cork, East End, Florida, and North East International. A BAFTA talent, she has worked with outstanding actors such as Francesca Annis and Rebecca Hall. Claire is currently writing Aqua Tofana, her Audible Original fiction podcast, a family crime drama with fairy-tale charm, set for international release in 2027. Her short stories have appeared in For Page & Screen Magazine, The Basilisk Tree, and Permafrost. She also runs the Soho House Women Writers' Salon at Holloway House.
Das Bleu
Das Bleu has never considered a backup plan, or at least he has never entertained a second option. That is, he always believed he "couldn't be anything else but a film director." This tireless conviction forms the foundation of his cinematic moxie, which he built, something like a bildungsroman, in New York City as a portrait and fashion photographer, and has since fortified in Chicago as a writer-director, resulting in a cornucopia overflowing with carefully constructed narratives that are concentric, verdant, imaginatively idiosyncratic, and sometimes surreal. A finalist at the Chicago Script Awards and recognized by the Austin Film Festival, Nashville Film Festival, Roadmap Writers, and many others, Bleu has built a compelling body of work that refuses to fit neatly into one genre. His features and shorts exist at the atmospheric intersections of romance and fate, the real world and the dream world, existential yearning, and psychological fragility. In other words, Bleu's kaleidoscopic storytelling is a luminous invitation to linger long after the last page, like a white sugar cube delicately dipped into a cup of black coffee. In 2025, Bleu directed SUDDENLY, COMPLETELY, FOREVER at Green Shirt Studio, further sharpening a filmmaking vision shaped by stirring character studies and synergistic experimentation. Whether exploring millennial relationships in WILD FOR LOVE, greed and violence in LADY TRUCK DRIVER, or the fractures of freewheeling love in AMERICAN WEDDING, Bleu crafts imperfect characters who are drifters, artists, lovers, killers, and ghosts, all burning for meaning and aching for transcendence, often setting their fragmented worlds on fire trying to find it. In the end, cinematic freedom is what Das Bleu ultimately seeks, and his screenplays and films speak the same language by not asking for your attention but demanding it, one bold slugline and spirited cut at a time.
Julia Moser
Julia Moser is a Los Angeles native who spent the first chunk of her career as an Emmy-winning producer in broadcast news. In her previous life, she worked at Good Morning America, BuzzFeed News, and she even did a stint at a local station here in L.A. During her time in news, she produced segments with celebrities and politicians including Dolly Parton and Hillary Clinton, newsmakers like the Parkland gun violence survivors and #MeToo founder Tarana Burke, as well as Gritty, the mascot of the Philadelphia Flyers. Julia decided to pursue an M.F.A. in Screenwriting from UCLA after realizing that she preferred fiction to the real world, and graduated in 2025.
Marissa Velez
Marissa Velez is a film and commercial director based in Brooklyn, NY. Born in Miami to Puerto Rican parents, she was raised on a steady diet of movie-going and travel—formative experiences that continue to shape her intimate, place-driven storytelling. Her work has screened at top festivals including Tribeca, Milan, and New York, and is known for its visually rich, emotionally grounded approach. Drawing inspiration from 1960s and ’70s cinema, she often shoots on 16mm and 35mm film to craft bold, nostalgic visuals rooted in texture and tone. Her latest short, PANTIES (2024), received multiple festival awards and was featured on platforms like Director’s Library and Nowness, further cementing her reputation for exploring identity, intimacy, and community with a distinct cinematic voice. She is currently in pre-production on her feature film debut, POSITIVE, as well as another feature, THE OFFER, co-directed with Makenzie Leigh and produced by Killer Films.
Michael Henry
Michael Henry is a Los Angeles-based writer, born and raised in Richmond, Virginia. During his undergraduate education, Michael majored in Sociology and spent his weekends crafting YouTube video essays about his favorite movie franchises (yes, his social life was a bit lacking). By way of a film production class during his senior year, he discovered both a love and aptitude for the craft of screenwriting. Realizing a deep desire to make entertainment more than just a hobby, Michael decided to pursue his dream of working in film and television. He completed an MFA in Film and Electronic Media at American University, where he received the School of Communication’s Visions Award for Best Feature Screenplay. Michael’s love of animation, comic books, and video games has informed an imaginative sensibility that marries high concept genre setups with emotional, character-driven journeys.
Sheida Sheikhha
Born and raised in the middle of the desert in Iran, Sheida is a Prague-based writer. Like most Iranians, she is often drawn to the subjects of freedom, captivity, and the fleeting nature of memory. She has a background in Architecture, an MA in Film Studies from Tehran University, and a second MFA in Directing Fiction from FAMU in Prague. Her graduation film, Please Rise, a political drama featuring Cannes award winner Zac Amir Ebrahimi, had its premiere in Poland’s prominent EnergaCAMERIMAGE festival in 2023. In 2024, along with her collaborator Bruno Grandino, Sheida won the International Project Spark Competition organized by Nanlite/Nanlux and received funding for Brighter Days, a short sci-fi currently having its festival run. In 2025, Brighter Days was screened as part of the Live-Action International Competition at the Short Shorts Film Festival & Asia. Since 2022, Sheida has been teaching filmmaking and screenwriting at FAMU and has mentored over 50 student films. She also served three times on the jury for Best Student Short at Watersprite Film Festival. Sheida is currently working on her next short, Empty House, which has recently received funding from the Czech AudioVisual Fund and amassed many screenwriting accolades, such as the ISA Award for Best Screenplay at HollyShorts Film Festival. Alongside Empty House, Sheida is also developing her debut feature, Sana, as part of the Nostos Screenwriting Retreat.
Bruno Grandino
Bruno Grandino is a Brazilian cinematographer/writer. He started his path in filmmaking over a decade ago in São Paulo where he began his film studies at Armando Alvares Penteado Foundation, one of the most renowned schools in the country. After freelancing for a few years as a cinematographer, Bruno attended FAMU in Prague, Czech Republic for a Master’s degree in cinematography and graduated in the year of 2022. During the past eight years in Prague, Bruno has shot and assisted in several films as part of his studies at FAMU and has also held classes on Lighting and Cinematography at the institution; there, he teaches and mentors aspiring filmmakers. His final thesis at FAMU focused on the use of certain cinematography tools in Italian Neorealist films and was awarded second place at FAMU’s Best Thesis award in 2022. In the following year, “Please Rise”, a film he shot was screened in the Panorama section at EnergaCAMERIMAGE, the prestigious international cinematography festival. In 2024, “Brighter Days”, an idea of his won the international Project Spark competition held by light manufacturers Nanlite and Nanlux and, as a result, was awarded funds to go into production. The film is currently having its festival run and was part of the main competition at the Academy Awards qualifying festival Short Shorts Film festival & Asia 2025. Currently, Bruno is developing a short, Empty House, and two features as a co-writer and cinematographer while also working on academic research.
Taylor Ventner
Taylor Venter is a Writer & Director of Film and Theatre based in Sydney, Australia. A graduate of the Australian Film, Television and Radio School (AFTRS) and The University of Sydney, she is driven by a love of courageous storytelling. Her debut short film Cathy’s Doll premiered at Sydney Film Festival, and went on to screen at festivals globally. Taylor is currently writing her debut feature film Cutting Daisies, developed at Torino Film Lab's Next Feature Film 2025 program. She is also writing her debut stage play, A Young Man's Game. Beginning her journey in the arts as a professional ballerina, Taylor trained on scholarship at The Australian Ballet School, and was the recipient of the Youth America Grand Prix Houston Ballet II Scholarship. She hones her craft as a Director’s Assistant, writing and designing pitch decks for a roster of acclaimed international directors.
Shanti Herzog
Shanti Herzog is an Ecuadorian-American screenwriter and filmmaker, originally from Redding, California. Most of her childhood was spent outdoors, exploring the lakes, mountains, and rivers of Northern California, and her storytelling often features nature as its own character and aspects of magical realism. She is currently based in Los Angeles and is developing her second short film and first feature screenplay.