Ava Cahen

Artistic Director

Ava Cahen is the Artistic Director of La Semaine de la Critique. Beforehand, she was a member of the feature film selection committee from 2016 to 2021. Since 2017, she has been running the website frenchMania.fr and the biannual film magazine FrenchMania. She is also a commentor for the TV programme "Le Cercle" on Canal + and "Le masque et la plume", a radio programme broadcast on France Inter. She has published several books on cinema and series and has participated in many juries such as the Jerusalem Int. Film Lab, Morelia IFF, Fifib, Champs-Elysées Film Festival to name a few.

Feature Films

Marilou Duponchel

Film journalist and critic for Les Inrockuptibles and for the magazine TroisCouleurs.

Damien Leblanc

A journalist and film critic for TroisCouleurs and Première magazines, Damien Leblanc was also a contributor for Flutuat.net and Le Point pop. He was the programmer and host of the Couleurs de la Toile film club. Damien has been part of several festival juries (including the Biarritz Latin Film Festival and the Cinélatino Festival in Toulouse), and was a Jury member for the French Union of Film Critic’s Award for First French and International Feature Film in 2015. He is also interested in contemporary forms of TV series and published a book in 2017, Les Révolutions de Mad Men

Frédéric Mercier

Film critic and writer for Transfuge, Positif and FrenchMania magazines. He also contributes to Le Cercle on Canal+. Frédéric teaches film history and film criticism, has worked on many special features for the DVDs of newly restored films and has his own film club in the outskirts of Paris. In 2016, he published his first book, Les écrivains du 7ème art, published by Séguier. 

Olivier Pélisson

Olivier Pelisson is journalist and critic of cinema, he writes for Bande à Part, Bref, French Mania and for Canal+ Grand Écran channel. He used to work for Zurban, DvdLive, Monsieurcinéma.comLeCinémadanslesyeux.com and on Top of ths Shorts show on Canal+ Cinéma. Over the years, he has been artistic director (Paris Film Festival), scenario reader (France 2 Cinéma, CNC), he has hosted some film critic workshop (Paris, Cannes, Bakouriani, Erevan), festivals meeting (La Ciotat, Moulins) and has been in international panel, and for the French Union of Film Critics. Olivier Pelisson is one of the contributor of Dictionnaire Eustache published by Léo Sheer editions.

Perrine Quennesson

Perrine Quennesson is an independant journalist who writes for several magazines such as CinémaTeaser, Film Français and Trois couleurs. She created and hosts the 7e Science podcast where Science meets cinema (produced by Sorbonne University and Binge Audio). Perrine Quennesson participates in Tchi Tcha and Le Cercle Séries shows, collaborates with many festivals (Lumière, Séries Mania, Champs Elysées Film Festival...) and with VOD plateform (FilmoTV). Beside that, she is a professor at l’Ecole Supérieure d’Etudes Cinématographiques (ESEC) in Paris.

Short Films

Marie-Pauline Mollaret

Coordinator

Marie-Pauline Mollaret is a film critic for the magazines Bref, L'Avant-Scène Cinema and Ecran Noir. She co-hosts Bulles de rêves program of Radio Libertaire dedicated to animation cinema and takes part of Les Couleurs de la toile movie club's organization. Simultaneously, she works as programmer and is a member of the selection committees of various festivals, including the Annecy International Animated Film Festival, and the PIAFF - the Paris International Animation Film Festival. For the past 6 years, Marie-Pauline was on the short film selection committee of La Semaine de la Critique and is now the committee coordinator.

Chloé Cavillier

Chloé Cavillier got a Literature and arts master degree and works with Critikat and Bref reviews. She has been a member of Pantin Côté Court festival’s selection committee for 3 years and she is now the artistic director of Fondation Jérôme Seydoux-Pathé and a university lecturer at Paris Nanterre. In 2020, she received the Young Critic Award from the French Union of Film Critics and became a member of the short film committee selection of La Semaine de la Critique in 2022.

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Thomas Fouet

He is a journalist for Les Fiches du cinéma, the co-host of the radio programme Longtemps je me suis couché de bonne heure, and member of the Film singulier jury at the French Union of Film Critics. Thomas Fouet is also the co-founder and former editor-in-chief of the online magazine Cinématraque, the assistant editor of Capsule, the co-creator of the book Les Sortilèges du blockbuster, and has been for three years (2017-2019), a member of the short-film election committee at La Semaine de la Critique.

Léo Ortuno

Léo Ortuno is a journalist and a film critic who works for Court-Circuit (Arte), Viva Cinéma (Ciné+) and Bande à Part. He also writes and produces a podcast about genre cinema for the Shadowz platform. He is a jury for several film festival, for the Syndicat de la Critique and is a member of programmation and selection committees (Festival de Contis, Poitiers Film Festival).