Jury

Features

SHANE ENGSTROM – FESTIVAL DIRECTOR/CO-DIRECTOR, OUT FILM CT (HARTFORD)

SHANE ENGSTROM – FESTIVAL DIRECTOR/CO-DIRECTOR, OUT FILM CT (HARTFORD)

Shane has volunteered with Out Film CT and the Connecticut LGBTQ Film Festival for the past 24 years, with this year marking his 17 th year as Festival Director/Co-Director. The festival is Connecticut’s longest-running film festival, now celebrating its 37th season. Out Film CT also partners with the classic Cinestudio theater to host a year-round monthly LGBTQ film series in Hartford, CT. He is a past recipient of the State of Connecticut Governor’s Award for “Distinguished Advocate” in recognition of his volunteer work at the festival. Shane has had the honor of serving as a jury member for several other film festivals in the past, including the Wicked Queer Film Festival (Boston), ImageOut: Rochester LGBT Film Festival, Out On Film: Atlanta’s LGBTQ Film Festival, and he is thrilled to be taking part in this year’s OUTshine Miami Film Festival.

RUBEN ROSARIO – FILM CRITIC AND CYBERJOURNALIST

RUBEN ROSARIO – FILM CRITIC AND CYBERJOURNALIST

Rubén Rosario is a film critic and cyberjournalist based out of Miami. He has been the film critic for the online publication Miamiartzine and a web writer for WSVN-TV since 2012. His work has also appeared on Beached Miami, CineSportsTalk, The Miami Herald, Pop Culture Pros, The Spool and Sun-Sentinel.

Documentaries

BRANDON DEL TORO – OPERATIONS DIRECTOR, IBEROAMERICAN FILM FESTIVAL OF MIAMI

BRANDON DEL TORO – OPERATIONS DIRECTOR, IBEROAMERICAN FILM FESTIVAL OF MIAMI

Born in Mexico City, Brandon studied Industrial Engineering and Systems at the Tec de Monterrey Campus Santa Fe, contest and won first place in Shorts with Voice, and stood out for his participation in different events related to television in Mexico, completed a diploma in Philosophy in Barcelona and a course in Administration with the IESEG University in Lille, France. He returned to Mexico to be part of the production of Mitsubishi Conciencia Cívica advertising campaign and FINTONIC launch campaign in 2019. He collaborated with the CDMX government for a campaign of “fitness motivation” where he worked with high-performance Mexican athletes. Brandon also dabbled in fashion production with runaways for different Mexican clothing brands and participated in 3 feature films in Mexico for Netflix. In 2019 he returned to Miami to be part of Ibero-American Film Festival Miami.

SOFIA WICKERHAUSER – FESTIVAL PROGRAMMER, WICKED QUEER (BOSTON), MIXBRASIL AND CURTA KINOFORUM

SOFIA WICKERHAUSER – FESTIVAL PROGRAMMER, WICKED QUEER (BOSTON), MIXBRASIL AND CURTA KINOFORUM

Sofia Wickerhauser is a filmmaker/screenwriter, producer and festival programmer with a passion for Queer cinema, photography, anime and video games. She directed and wrote four Queer shorts that were screened at over 100 festivals - like BFI Flare, Frameline, Inside Out, Palm Springs - and won several awards, including “Infinite While It Lasts”, famous worldwide for being the first fiction film about asexuality. Since 2018, she has been working as a festival programmer, today for Boston’s Wicked Queer, MixBrasil and Curta Kinoforum, and in the past for Whistler, Ramsgate and Norwich Film Festival. Having also worked with short film distribution, she became a distribution teacher in 2020. She has been a member of the Brazilian Film Academy since 2021.

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