The time has come to reveal the jurors for the 8th Working Title Film Festival!
There are three competition sections: Feature Films, Short Films and ExtraWorks. For each section, we have appointed a two-person jury, which will award a prize to the best film in that section.
The Feature Films jury consists of Valentina Cicogna and Francesca Scalisi.
Valentina Cicogna (1984), a graduate of the Civica Scuola di Cinema Luchino Visconti in Milan, is a screenwriter and editor; she teaches at CISA in Locarno and is an editing tutor at the Dok Incubator workshop. Her screenwriting credits include The Human Factor, directed by Bruno Oliviero and starring Silvio Orlando, which was screened at the Locarno Film Festival, and Silvio Soldini’s short film Olmo, which was screened at the Rome Film Fest. Her editing credits include The Disappearance of My Mother by Beniamino Barrese, which was screened at Sundance 2019 and nominated for the 2019 European Film Awards; Brotherhood by Francesco Montagner, winner of the Cineasti del Presente award at Locarno; and A Steady Job by Mattia Colombo and Gianluca Matarrese, which was screened at Cinema du Réel and won awards at HotDocs and DMZ. Pure Unknown, her directorial debut, co-directed with Mattia Colombo, won awards at Visions du Réel and DMZ, and was nominated for the Nastri d’Argento and the David di Donatello awards.
Francesca Scalisi (1982) is an Italian filmmaker and visual artist based both in Italy and Switzerland, where she co-founded the production company Dok Mobile. Her films have been featured and awarded at festivals including the International Film Festival Rotterdam, the International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam (IDFA), and the Chicago International Film Festival, and have been distributed on platforms such as MUBI and Netflix. Her latest feature-length documentary, Valentina and the MUOSters, received the FIPRESCI Prize at Dok Leipzig and the Special Jury Prize at Visions du Réel. Her works have been screened at museums and arts institutions, including the Kunstmuseum Brandts (Denmark), the Stedelijk Museum Schiedam (Netherlands) and the Centre Dürrenmatt Neuchâtel (Switzerland). She is the artistic director of the Flying Film Festival and a member of the selection committee for the Fribourg International Film Festival.
The Short Films jury consists of Liryc Dela Cruz and Micaela Veronesi.
Liryc Dela Cruz (1992) is a Filipino filmmaker and artist currently living in Rome. His practice spans film, installation, and performance. He is the co-founder of the Il Mio Filippino Collective and a member of the artist collective Pescheria in Roma Est. His debut feature, Where the night stands still (2025), premiered at the Berlinale and won the Golden Goblet for Best Director at the Shanghai International Film Festival. His work has also been presented at Locarno, Lincoln Center, MACRO, Mattatoio di Roma, the École du Louvre, and Fondazione Sandretto Re Rebaudengo. In 2026 his short film A Brief Encounter was selected as the closing film of the International Critics’ Week at the Venice Film Festival.
Micaela Veronesi (1969), a film historian and critic, is responsible for educational programmes and project development at the National Film Archive of the Italian Resistance. She is a subject expert at the University of Turin. She published Le soglie del film. Inizio e fine nel cinema (Kaplan, 2005) and Il cinema arte dei corpi (with Francesca Brignoli, Unicopli, 2019). She edited (with Daniela Ricci) the volume Visioni del rimosso. Lo sguardo cinematografico sul colonialismo italiano (Mimesis, 2024). She wrote the biographies of Elvira Giallanella and Renée Deliot for the ‘Women Film Pioneers Project’.
The ExtraWorks jury consists of Alberto Baroni and Martina Melilli.
Alberto Baroni (1986) is an independent filmmaker. He works with the University Television Centre at the University of Milan, where he graduated with a dissertation on Fritz Lang, and writes for the online film magazine “Gli Spietati”. His short film Chariot, featuring a made-up language and screened at the Filmmaker Festival, won the award for Best Cinematography at the ValdarnoCinema Film Festival. Ephesus won the Best Film award at the Brianza Film Corto Festival. Le – Toi – Ile won the Best Sound Design award at the Hermetic International Film Festival. La Force won the Best Experimental Short award at the Desenzano Film Festival, following screenings at Filmmaker, at ShortCircuit in Brighton, and at the Internationales Festival Zeichen der Nacht in Berlin. The Hermit was screened in competition at Signes De Nuit in Paris, won a Special Mention at Avvistamenti and was screened in the Special Screenings section at the Trento Film Festival.
Martina Melilli (1987) is a multidisciplinary artist, film director, and cultural practitioner. She holds a Master’s degree in Visual Arts from the IUAV University of Venice and an Executive Master’s in Cultural Welfare from the Cultural Welfare Center in Turin. She studied documentary and experimental film at the Luca School of Arts in Brussels and attended the course on sound design for documentaries at Les Ateliers Varan in Paris. Her work has been screened at international film festivals – The Fourth Day of School in Rotterdam, My Home, in Libya in Locarno, Dok Leipzig and Chicago – and exhibited at Palazzo Strozzi in Florence, the Museo del Novecento and the PAC in Milan. In 2022, she was selected for Berlinale Talents. With Botafuego, she produced podcasts and radio series for Rai, and with Nuovo Cineforum Rovereto she curates festivals and programmes for the Mart museum. She teaches video production at Spazio Labo’ in Bologna.