BIO | Asimina Proedrou | Writer – Director

 

Asimina was born in 1982, in Athens, Greece. She studied music (piano degree in 2001), International Economics (BA in 2005 and MSc in 2007) and Film Directing (BA in 2013 and MA in 2016), while working for the finance department of a large international corporation for fourteen years. 

She has produced, written and directed two multi-awarded short films (FACETS OF LONELINESS, 2012; RED HULK, 2013). Her short film, RED HULK (2013), won the Best Short Film Awards at the two major film festivals in Greece. It was officially selected for more than seventy international film festivals, including Clermont-Ferrand (International Competition 2014), and won seven international awards. 

Asimina is an alumna of Sarajevo Talents 2015 and Berlinale Talents 2015. Her debut feature film, BEHIND THE HAYSTACKS (2022), is a Greek-German-North Macedonian co-production, developed through Berlinale Script Station 2016, First Film First 2017-2018 and EAVE 2018, and supported, among others, by the Greek Film Centre, ERT, MEDIA, ZDF-Arte and Eurimages.

BEHIND THE HAYSTACKS premiered at the 63rd Thessaloniki International Film Festival (National Premiere) in November 2022, where it won six awards including Fipresci Award, and at the 53rd International Film Festival of India (Goa) (International Premiere) where it won the Best Debut Feature Award. It is officially selected for the Palm Springs International Film Festival (North American premiere in January 2024), for the Sydney International Film Festival (EFP Program, Europe! Voices of Women in Film), as well as for several other notable international film festivals.

BEHIND THE HAYSTACKS was a great success in Greece, with a major cinema release of more than 30 consecutive weeks. It has been critically acclaimed both locally and Internationally, and was described as “an intriguing and deft debut […] of an intense psychological study of murky morality” (Screen Daily) and “a contemporary Greek tragedy” in which Proedrou juggles “multi-character complexity and non-linear narratives with impressive dexterity” (The Film Verdict). 

The film won 10 awards at the Greek Film Academy awards, including the prestigious Best Film Award, along with nine additional accolades: Best Director, Best First-Time Director, Best Screenplay, Best Cinematography, Best Editing, Best Sound, Best Actor, Best Supporting Actor and Best Supporting Actress. This achievement also marks a record-breaking number of nominations in the history of the institution, as the film got 17 nominations for 16 categories. 

BEHIND THE HAYSTACKS is among the 40 Best European Films chosen for the Feature Film Selection 2023 for this year's European Film Awards. It is among the 9 films selected for the Goya Spanish Academy Awards, and among the 5 films nominated for the 2023 Casting Semiramis Award by the International Casting Directors Association - ICDA.

BEHIND THE HAYSTACKS is the official Greek entry for the 96th Academy Awards (International Oscar).

Asimina is currently developing two new feature project scripts and the pilot for a TV series.