| Sofia Bohdanowicz | |
| Nationality: | Canadian |
| Occupation: | Filmmaker |
| Years Active: | 2009–present |
| Known For: | Maison du Bonheur |
Sofia Bohdanowicz is a Canadian filmmaker.[1] She is known for her collaborations with Deragh Campbell and made her feature film directorial debut in 2016 with Never Eat Alone. Her second feature film, Maison du Bonheur, was a finalist for the Rogers Best Canadian Film Award at the 2018 Toronto Film Critics Association Awards. That year, she won the Jay Scott Prize from the Toronto Film Critics Association. Her third feature film, MS Slavic 7, which she co-directed with Campbell, had its world premiere at the 69th Berlin International Film Festival in 2019. She has also directed several short films, such as Veslemøy's Song (2018) and Point and Line to Plane (2020).
After directing several short films since 2009, Bohdanowicz made her feature film directorial debut in 2016 with Never Eat Alone.[2] The film follows a lonely grandmother as she tries to reconnect with an ex-boyfriend from her youth. After premiering at the Vancouver International Film Festival, it screened at the Buenos Aires International Festival of Independent Cinema as part of a 2017 retrospective of Bohdanowicz's work.[3] Her second feature film, Maison du Bonheur, which profiles 77-year-old Juliane Sellam, a French astrologer living in Montmartre, was a finalist for the Rogers Best Canadian Film Award at the Toronto Film Critics Association Awards 2018.[4] The film premiered at the Buenos Aires International Festival of Independent Cinema on April 23, 2017,[5] and had a limited theatrical release in the U.S. and Canada in 2018.[6] [7] The Globe and Mail
Her collaborations with actress Deragh Campbell have screened at festivals around the world. Since 2016, Campbell has portrayed the character of Audrey Benac in four of Bohdanowicz's films—Never Eat Alone, Veslemøy's Song (2018), and MS Slavic 7 (2019), the latter of which Campbell co-directed.[10] Never Eat Alone premiered in the Future//Present section of the 2016 Vancouver International Film Festival;[2] Veslemøy's Song, a short film, premiered at the 2018 Locarno Film Festival and was named by the Toronto International Film Festival to its annual year-end Canada's Top Ten list;[11] [12] MS Slavic 7 had its world premiere at the 69th Berlin International Film Festival and screened at the annual New Directors/New Films Festival.[13] [14]
Her latest short film, Point and Line to Plane, which also featured Campbell as the fictional character Audrey Benac,[15] premiered at the Marseille International Film Festival in July 2020 and subsequently screened at the Toronto International Film Festival, the New York Film Festival, the Festival de nouveau cinéma in Montreal, and the Vienna International Film Festival, among others.[16] [17] [18]
In a 2020 interview with film website Seventh Row, Bohdanowicz revealed that despite directing and editing several feature films, she has never written a screenplay.[19] That year, she also directed a short documentary film titled The Hardest Working Cat in Show Biz, which was released online by Filmmaker.[20]
In 2021, she was one of the participants in John Greyson's experimental short documentary film International Dawn Chorus Day.[21]
In 2022, Bohdanowicz participated in the Sight & Sound film polls of that year. It is held every ten years to select the greatest films of all time, by asking contemporary directors to select ten films of their choice.[22]
Bohdanowicz selections were:
Bohdanowicz has won accolades for her work. In 2016, at the Vancouver International Film Festival, Bohdanowicz won the Emerging Canadian Director award for Never Eat Alone.[2] At the 17th Vancouver Film Critics Circle Awards, she was nominated for Best Director of a Canadian Film and won the award for Best Canadian Documentary.[23] In 2018, she was awarded the Jay Scott Prize by the Toronto Film Critics Association.[24]
| Year | Film | Type | Director | Writer | Producer | Cinematographer | Editor | Notes | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2009 | Falling with Force | Short film | |||||||
| 2012 | Dundas Street | Short film | Co-directed with Joanna Durkalec | ||||||
| 2013 | An Evening (Wieczór) | Short film | |||||||
| A Prayer (Modlitwa) | Short film | ||||||||
| 2014 | Another Prayer (Dalsza Modlitwa) | Short film | |||||||
| 2016 | A Drownful Brilliance of Wings | Short film | |||||||
| Never Eat Alone | Feature film | Feature directorial debut | |||||||
| 2017 | Maison du Bonheur | Feature film | Documentary | ||||||
| 2018 | Veslemøy's Song | Short film | |||||||
| The Soft Space | Short film | Co-directed with Melanie Scheiner | |||||||
| 2019 | MS Slavic 7 | Feature film | Co-directed with Deragh Campbell | ||||||
| 2020 | Point and Line to Plane | Short film | |||||||
| 2020 | The Hardest Working Cat in Show Biz | Short film | Documentary | ||||||
| 2024 | Measures for a Funeral | Feature film |