(working title)

feature documentary film, 16mm (in post-production)
directed by Toma Peiu and Luiza Parvu

A poetic journey across New York in times of pandemic, war and urban transformation, guided by an oral history of the Russian-speaking Korean Central Asian diaspora.

Feature documentary, 2024
with Philly Abe
https://www.flyinglessonsdoc.com/

directed by Elizabeth Nichols
edited, written, co-produced by Luiza Parvu

Flying Lessons tells the story of punk artist Philly Abe’s intimate journey of social, artistic and spiritual transformation in the face of New York City’s cultural crisis. Philly mourns the city she once loved as she joins with a band of anti-gentrification tenants to fight against harassment by their notorious landlord.

directed by Elizabeth Nichols
written by Chris Boeckmann, Elizabeth Nichols, Luiza Pârvu
cinematography by Elizabeth Nichols
edited by Luiza Parvu
sound recording by Lydia Chammas
produced by Alik Barsoumian, Elizabeth Nichols
executive produced by Todd Verow

Festival Selection:

True/False Film Festival - World Premiere (Mar 1, 2024)
First Look Film Festival - NY Premiere (Mar 16, 2024)

short documentary, 11 min, 2024
directed, shot, edited by Luiza Parvu

A transcontinental daughter-mother conversation about the life of Romanian women under dictatorship and patriarchy is catalyzed by sea changes in the Arizona abortion law, Orthodox Easter egg painting, and the migrant experience. Through sisterhood and solidarity, the film seeks to create common ground and heal intergenerational trauma.

Produced by Root Films

Feature film, fiction, 106 min, 2020

directed by Rezwan Shahriar Sumit
edited by Luiza Pârvu / associate producer Luiza Pârvu

For his latest art installation, Rudro journeys to a remote mangrove isle on the Bangladeshi Delta, a day's boat ride and a world away from modern, crowded Dhaka. Welcomed by the local fishermen and their leader Chairman, Rudro's modern ideas and lifelike sculptures enchant the village boys and his landlord's daughter. But when the local Ilish catch proves elusive, the elders blame Rudro’s “idolatry” for the curse of empty nets. In this vanishing land where sea and sky merge, a storm is brewing and change –welcome or not—is coming.

directed by Rezwan Shahriar Sumit
written by Rezwan Shahriar Sumit
cinematography by Chananun Chotrungroj
edited by Kristan Sprague, Luiza Pârvu, Sankha
creative producer & production designer Sylvain Nahmias
sculptor Mahmudul Hasan Shohag
sound design by Tiago Cardoso & Dinis Henriques
casting director Rafi Sumon
music composer Arnob
post production supervisor Guy Courtecuisse
senior color grader Olivier Garcia
produced by Rezwan Shahriar Sumit (mypixelstory), Ilann Girard (ARSAM International)

Cast (Selected):

Titas Zia – Rudro
Tasnova Tamanna – Tuni
Fazlur Rahman Babu – Chairman
Shatabdi Wadud – Talash
Ashok Bepari – Bashar

Short documentary, 14 min, 2020

directed by Brett Story
additional cinematography by Luiza Pârvu

Extreme Risk Protection Orders, otherwise known as “red flag” laws, give state authorities the ability to temporarily seize guns from someone deemed to be an immediate threat to themselves or others. On January 1, 2020, Colorado became the 17th state in the US to pass a ‘red flag’ law, provoking a number of county sheriffs opposed to the law to declare their counties “2nd Amendment sanctuaries.”

“Sanctuary” follows a handful of Coloradans on multiple sides of this controversial issue as the bill comes into law, including a state legislator and domestic abuse survivor, a member of a local militia, and a Colorado county sheriff. As these individuals address the threats, real and imagined, that the law responds to or poses, “Sanctuary” offers a timely meditation on the meaning of safety in America today.

directed by Brett Story
director of photography Matt Corliss
additional cinematography by Luiza Pârvu
edited by Hedia Maron
original score by Kieran Adams
sound design and mix by Heather Kirby
produced by Jason Fox
executive producers Julie Parker Benello, Jenni Wolfson, Lucila Moctezuma
series producer Kelly Duane de la Vega

“Sanctuary” was produced by Chicken & Egg Pictures through Docs by the Dozen, in partnership with Mother Jones.

Short, documentary, 25 min

Objects in an antique shop in Québec tell a story about the present of artisan culture in the city and beyond. With humor and wit, the film travels from one workshop to another, in the quest for the forgotten tales of everyday items: from snowshoes to leather apparel and from license plates to violins.

directed by Luiza Pârvu & Toma Peiu
written by Toma Peiu
text by Joanie Lehoux & Toma Peiu
cinematography by Luiza Pârvu
editing & sound design by Luiza Pârvu
sound mixing by Toma Peiu
narrated by Joanie Lehoux
produced by Luiza Pârvu, Toma Peiu, Yannick Nolin

Directors’ Statement 

"Si Les Objets Pouvaient Parler" originated in our passion for the unique street & storefront artisan culture of Ville de Quebec. We were fortunate to meet gracious protagonists, who opened their workshops to us and candidly shared stories related to their work and personal life. Shot over one week in Summer 2017, the film highlights a thriving culture that will hopefully resist waves of change in our social and economic paradigm.

Produced by KINOMADA & Root Films

2018

Feature, experimental documentary, 98 min, 2018

directed by Lana Lin
additional camera by Toma Peiu, Luiza Pârvu

A chorus of voices recite Black feminist poet Audre Lorde’s 1980 memoir of her cancer experience, and reflect upon its personal and political impact in the present moment.

The Cancer Journals Revisited is prompted by the question of what it means to re-visit and re-vision Black lesbian feminist poet Audre Lorde’s classic 1980 memoir of her breast cancer experience today.

At the invitation of the filmmaker, who was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2010, twenty-seven writers, artists, activists, health care advocates, and current and former patients recite Lorde’s manifesto aloud on camera, collectively dramatizing it and producing an oration for the screen. The film is both a critical commentary and a poetic reflection upon the precarious conditions of survival within the intimate and politicized public sphere of illness.

directed by Lana Lin
director of photography H. Lan Thao Lam
camera by Luz Marina Zamora, Johanne Ebel, Cristina Mueller, Lana Lin
additional camera by Toma Peiu, Luiza Pârvu, Daryl Meador
edited by Lana Lin
sound design by Paul Hill, Gisburg Smialek
color correction and sound mix by Paul Hill
score by Gisburg Smialek
produced by Lana Lin

Short, documentary, 34 min, 2017

WATCH SHORT FILM

The heart of a metropolis beats in its neighborhoods. Five communities reveal the other New York. 

directed by Toma Peiu
cinematography by Shan Jin, Toma Peiu, Luiza Pârvu
editing and sound design by Luiza Pârvu
produced by Toma Peiu & Luiza Pârvu

Director's Statement

The civil society of the 21st century global city spend their everyday around neighborhood street corners, stores and public transit stops, outside the reach of mainstream media and show business. Rituals, routines and unexpected events woven into the fabric of the civilian experience reveal themselves to the attentive eye. Civilians is an exploration of life in the metropolis, framing everyday scenes in the streets of “the other New York”: a collection of communities whose specificity is challenged nowadays by advancing gentrification and changes in the city’s economic paradigm.

Two cooks prepare a tray of dim sum by a sidewalk window; mothers bid a long goodbye to their children, outside a parked school bus; a group of firefighters shop at a local supermarket; two elderly brothers sing in front of an audience for the first time; a father and son await the train home, the evening before Thanksgiving. In Civilians, a bricoleur looks at the public landscape and its inhabitants in melancholic “open window” frames unearthing the poetry hidden in the mundane of a contemporary American city, captured over one Thanksgiving week.

Produced by Root Films (Romania) and The New School University (USA)  

2017

Short, fiction, 15 min, 2016

directed by Lauren Fritz
edited by Luiza Pârvu

A young gay woman long in the shadow of her famous mother is suddenly forced to confront a life without her.

Marla is a young woman who has spent her life in the long, dark shadow of her mother Gloria, a famous war photojournalist. When Marla finally begins to make a decisive move away and apart from Gloria, Gloria reveals plans that threaten to drag Marla back into her mother's dark world from which Marla may never be able to escape from.

directed by Lauren Fritz
written by Lauren Fritz & Carmen Zilles
cinematography by Oren Soffer
production design by Andrea Lauer
edited by Luiza Pârvu
sound design by Matthew Polis
color grading by Erik Choquette
composer Gene Back
produced by Lauren Fritz, Nathan Niamehr, Debbie Walters

Cast:

Carmen Zilles – Marla
Lisa Ramirez – Gloria
Liam Torres – Bobby
Daniela Mastropietro – Chiara

Short, experimental, documentary, 7 min, 2016

WATCH SHORT FILM

A visualization of Albert Camus’ The Myth of Sisyphus, through the lens of surveillance cameras around the world.

directed by Luiza Pârvu & Toma Peiu
written by Toma Peiu
adapted from The Myth of Sisyphus by Albert Camus
editing & sound design by Luiza Pârvu
narration by Brett Stiller

Directors' Statement

Video surveillance has penetrated virtually every space inhabited by humans. Tragedies, excitement, catastrophes, moments of bliss and the everyday life of the common man are nowadays documented on an unprecedented scale. Countless hours are recorded daily in an endless narrative of the spectacle of human existence. The content is usually available to private eyes, and the universal meaning obscured by the apparent disconnect between the various individuals, spaces and activities recorded.

Made entirely out of surveillance footage available online, Sisyphus 2.0 is meant to mirror existentialist philosopher Albert Camus’ text, originally published in 1942, in present day’s reality. It is a bookmark we are trying to place, in an attempt to capture the particular mark of a certain moment in the evolution of the post-industrial era, doing our best not to obscure the timeless, tireless and resilient nature of the manifestations of the human spirit. 

Produced by Root Films (Romania) & NYU Tisch School of the Arts (USA)

2016

Short, documentary, experimental, 4 min, 2016

Arabidopsis thaliana juxtaposes the implications of injury, development and regeneration for plants, humans and cities, with a nod to one of the most popular plant model organisms in biology and genetics.

written & directed by Toma Peiu & Nicholas DelRose
narrated by Selima Smith-Dell
cinematography by Toma Peiu & Luiza Pârvu
microscope imagery & graphics by Nicholas DelRose
editing & sound design by Luiza Pârvu
location sound by Toma Peiu
produced by Nicholas DelRose, Toma Peiu, Luiza Pârvu

Research of Dr. Kenneth Birnbaum’s Lab

A Root Films production, for the Symbiosis Film Competition - Imagine Science Film Festival

2016

Short, fiction, 9 min, 2015

directed by Reinaldo Marcus Green
edited by Luiza Pârvu

A young man's livelihood is put to the test when he gets profiled and stopped by the police on his way home from practice.

directed by Reinaldo Marcus Green
written by Reinaldo Marcus Green
cinematography by Federico Cesca
production design by Alexandra Kaucher
edited by Justin Chan, Luiza Pârvu
sound design by Arjun Seth
produced by Chiara Bernasconi, Reinaldo Marcus Green
executive producer Rashaad Ernesto Green

Cast:

Keishawn Butler – Xavier
Joshua Rivera – Josh
Brian Pollock – Officer Montori
J.W. Cortes – Officer Caceres
Janelle Williamson - Xavier's Mother

Reviews:

"Full disclosure: after watching it three times, I’d go so far as to call it a short film masterpiece [...] Stop is a quiet tour-de-force, a pent up cry for humanity and fairness in a system that feeds off its own worst instincts." —Mike Tully, Hammer to Nail

"Reinaldo Marcus Green’s gripping nine-minute drama, shot in two nights on location in Red Hook, Brooklyn, centers around a student athlete who is stopped by the police for no other reason than the color of his skin. Displaying real filmmaking finesse, 'Stop' is a timely tale well told." —Kim Adelman, indieWIRE

"A riveting, tension-filled short that studies the uncomfortable details apparent in racial profiling." —Erik Luers, Shadow and Act

"Probably one of the most important and timely shorts for America this year. Reinaldo Marcus Green's film addresses the upsetting aspects of New York City's stop-and-frisk policies with sensitivity and insight." —Jeff Bowers, VICE

"The film packs a lot in nine minutes with its timely topic and subtle hand." —Maddy Kadish, Independent

STOP OFFICIAL SELECTIONS / AWARDS 2015

Sundance Film Festival (World Premiere), Hammer to Nail (Runner Up) Omaha Film Festival, Atlanta Film Festival, Annapolis Film Festival, Aspen Shortsfest, Ashland Independent Film Festival, Florida Film Festival, Sarasota Film Festival, Tribeca Film Festival, Nashville Film Festival, Chicago Critics Film Festival, Twister Alley Film Festival, Berkshire International Film Festival, Rooftop Films, Milwaukee Film Festival, Monadnock Film Festival, West Chester Film Festival, Longstory Shorts Film Festival, First Run Film Festival, Rainier Independent Film Festival,Mammoth Lakes Film Festival, St. Cloud Film Festival (Grand Jury Prize), Los Angeles Film Festival, Oak Cliff Film Festival, Cayman Islands Film Festival, Indy Film Fest, Guanajuato International Film Festival, Tacoma Film Festival (25 New Faces)l, BFI London Film Festival,Bend Film Festival, Nitehawk Film Festival, Wandering Reel Film Festival, Tampere Film Festival (Finland)

*National Board of Review (Student Grant Winner)
*AdWeek Watch Awards (Winner Best Drama Video)
*Rooftop Films Special Screening, The Frame
*Short of the Week
*VICE Best Online Shorts 2015

Contact:

info@greenbrosfilms.com | facebook.com/stoptheshort | twitter: @greenbrosfilms

Short, fiction, 23 min, 2014

A short narrative film telling a story from a forgotten generation of Romanian US immigrants. 

Pennsylvania, 1908. Romanian immigrant cobbler Petru greets his cousin's wife Ana in their New World home, with silent affection. Before he wins her heart, however, he needs to break a piece of news that will change her for good.

directed by Luiza Pârvu
written by Toma Peiu
cinematography by Shan Jin
production design by Lulu Petrescu, Adriana Răcășan, Erin Vassilopoulos
edited by Luiza Pârvu, Tudor D. Popescu
sound design by Laura Lăzărescu-Thois
composer Grigore Leșe
producers Toma Peiu, Luiza Pârvu, Adriana Răcășan, Andras Muhi, Gabor Ferenczy, Mihai Penișoară 

Cast: 
Florin Penișoară – Petru
Olimpia Melinte – Ana
Ioan Ardelean – Wojnarowski

Root Films (RO) / Focus Fox (HU) / Penproduction.ro (RO) / DaKino Productions (RO) / NYU Tisch (US) 

Romania – Hungary – USA, 2014

Short, fiction, 14 min, 2014

Teenager Alma visits the abandoned house of her late grandparents, in search for an answer to a complicated question.

directed by Luiza Pârvu
written by Luiza Pârvu, Toma Peiu
cinematography by Eduard Pârvu
location sound by Toma Peiu
editing & sound design by Răzvan Ilinca
production design by Luiza Pârvu, Toma Peiu
executive producers Eduard Pârvu, Luiza Pârvu, Toma Peiu

Introducing
Andreea Diaconița – Alma

Produced by UNATC “I.L. Caragiale” Bucharest

2014

Short, fiction, 12 min, 2014

A homeless young woman accidentally breaks into a lone man's house, unwillingly becoming part of an unexpected personal quest with a twist, engineered by an unseen friend.

directed by Luiza Pârvu
written by Toma Peiu, Luiza Pârvu
cinematography by James K. Ferguson
production design by Luiza Pârvu, Toma Peiu
edited by Luiza Pârvu
sound design by Luiza Pârvu
executive producers Toma Peiu, Luiza Pârvu 

CAST
Jessica Mermelstein – Annie
Jesse Goldberger - Larry

Produced by Root Films (Romania) & NYU Tisch School of the Arts (USA)

2014

Short, fiction, 19 min, 2013

Security guard Iulia, interior decorator Andi and English language teacher Ana are bound by a series of decisions that could change their lives forever. Each of them depends on the others' actions. Each one of them gets to care for and needs to be taken care of. Transparent windows are not necessarily see-through.

directed by Luiza Pârvu
written by Toma Peiu
cinematography by Andrei Goagă
production design by Lulu Petrescu
edited by Letiţia Ştefănescu
sound design by Laura Lăzărescu
composer Francesco Agnello
executive producer Gabi Suciu

Cast:

Rodica Lazăr – Iulia
Cristian Popa – Andi
Olimpia Melinte – Ana
Valentin Bărbătei – Vali
Delia Matei – Delia
Lucia Maier – Lucia

Produced by UNATC "I.L. Caragiale", Bucharest, Romania

2013

Short, fiction, 24 min, 2011

Two young actors, Olimpia and Edi, meet in an Irish Pub downtown Bucharest and start rehearsing for their next short film. Waiting for the director, who never shows up, they walk around the shooting locations. While discovering their characters and talking about how they would like the movie to end, they discover themselves and the complicated feelings that they experience.

written & directed by Luiza Pârvu
co-written by Toma Peiu
cinematography by Mihai Marius Apopei
edited by Letitia Stefanescu

Cast:
Olimpia Melinte - Olimpia / Ina
Eduard Jighirgiu - Edi / Marius

Produced by UNATC "I.L. Caragiale" Bucharest

2011

Short, fiction, 16 min, 2010

Adina tries to make a birthday for herself, but this is no easy task for a lonely bus ticket saleswoman, living alone in the old apartment of her late parents. She eventually finds an unusual way of spending the day, when she decides to call a professional party entertainer agency.

directed by Luiza Pârvu
written by Luiza Pârvu, Toma Peiu
cinematography by Andrei Goagă
edited by Letiția Ștefănescu
sound design by Tudor D. Popescu, Tudor Calnegru
production design by Ana Cântabine
trailer theme song by Mihai Dobre, Alex Pop
 

Cast
Adina Lucaciu - Adina
Dan Badea - Dan
Sergiu Costache - Salesman
Gabriel Spahiu - Mircea (Voice)

Produced by UNATC "I.L. Caragiale" Bucharest

2010


 

Vera's continuous quest to find love in simple things around her leads to unpredictable consequences.

Short, fiction, 9 min, 2009

directed by Luiza Pârvu
written by Luiza Pârvu, Raluca Manescu
cinematography by Andrei Goaga
location sound by Toma Peiu
editing by Letitia Stefanescu
sound mixing & design by Stefan Matei
music composition by Ioana Tiberian
executive producer Andrei Goaga

Cast
Laura Ilie – Vera
Conrad Mericoffer - The Boy
Marina Neagu - The Girl
Razvan Antonescu - Sergiu

Produced by UNATC “I.L. Caragiale” Bucharest

2009

Feature documentary - in post-production

"Ubi Bene Ibi Patria" is a first-person documentary looking at transnational migration across Europe and the U.S., gravitating around past and present Romanian immigrant stories.

directed by Luiza Pârvu & Toma Peiu
cinematography by Luiza Pârvu
editing and sound design by Luiza Pârvu
location sound by Toma Peiu
produced by Toma Peiu & Luiza Pârvu