Naël Marandin

Marandin started acting as a child, he played in such films as Les allumettes suédoises (The Swedish matches) and La ville dont le prince est un enfant (The city whose prince is a child). After that he took a break from acting and studied political science. For several years, he lived in China and Tibet. Upon return to France, he emerged as a video maker and film director, releasing two prized shorts: Foreign Bodies and No neighborhood.^[1][2][3]

His first feature, She walks, was released in 2015. The film tells the story of Lin Aiyu, an illegal Chinese immigrant living in Belleville, who works as a prostitute hiding it from her teenage daughter.^[4] At the project stage, the film won the Centre national du cinéma et de l'image animée (CNC) project competition and received a grant for production.^[5]

His second feature, Beasts (La terre des hommes),^[6] was also supported by the CNC.^[7] The screenplay was co-written with Marion Doussot and Marion Desseigne-Ravel.^[8] The movie was well received by critics,^[9] it won the Best Cinematography Prize at the Tallinn Black Nights Festival,^[10] took the Grand Prix at the 2020 Saint-Jean-de-Luz Film Festival^[11] and at the Saint-Jean-de-Luz IFF,^[12] won Best Acting and the Audience Award at the 36th Mons International Film Festival,^[13] and the 2020 Critics’ Week label of the 2020 Cannes Film Festival.^[14]