Boards & Staff

Diana Sanchez has over 25 years of experience in the international and Canadian film industry. She has held key positions at major festivals, including TIFF, where she served as Senior Director of Film and International Programmer, as well as the Miami, Rotterdam, and Los Angeles Latino (LALIFF) film festivals.

As a Founder of the International Film Festival of Panama, Diana identified the need for a festival dedicated to Central American and Caribbean films, making IFF Panama a launchpad for the region, described by Variety as “one of the world’s most quickly consolidating festivals.”

A lifelong learner and educator, Diana holds an MA in Cinema Studies from the University of Toronto. She recently led the first season of U of T’s ‘Pop-Up’ Cinematheque, developing a partnership between the Media Commons Archives and the Cinema Studies Institute to highlight the Archives’ collection and provide access for students and diverse audiences to participate in campus programming.

As the Managing Director of Hot Docs, Heidi translates the organization’s vision into operational roles, optimizing festival and program standards, helping to expand Hot Docs’ brand nationally and internationally, and fostering stakeholder engagement. In her previous role as Director of Funds & Labs, Heidi oversaw the disbursement of over $4M in funding to filmmakers of diverse backgrounds. She has executive produced 15 short films for Hot Docs and has supervised just under 100 hours of unscripted television. Before her recent appointment, Heidi directed funds and lab programs that included the design of the inaugural Hot Docs Incubator, a Netflix-supported program for documentary filmmakers seeking growth and showcasing creative and market potential. If there is a spare moment, she tries to fit in reading, and taking a semi-strenuous hike.

Heather is the Director of Programming at Hot Docs, with nearly two decades of experience, including roles as Senior International Programmer and Associate Director of Festival Programming. She has extensive experience in Latin America and collaborates internationally with filmmakers on work-in-progress sessions and juries. Heather has recommended for Chicken & Egg Pictures' (Egg)celerator Labs, programmed for the Human Rights Watch Film Festival, imagineNATIVE and AluCine. She has produced three award-winning documentaries and the performance art film ISHI, based on James Luna’s work. She has a strong background in producing innovative projects in visual/performance arts, film, and theatre, with a focus on human rights and cultural issues. She founded Toronto Free Gallery and Culture Storm, both dedicated to social and political engagement, and was the former publisher of Fuse Magazine. In 2018, she became a founding collective member and producer for Indigenous Fashion Week Toronto.

Elspeth is a film programmer and disability advocate originally from Saint John, New Brunswick and currently based in Toronto, Ontario. She is the EA/Operations Manager of the Disability Screen Office, an organization working to eliminate accessibility barriers and foster authentic and meaningful disability representation in the Canadian screen industries. Prior to joining the DSO, Elspeth was part of the Youth & Education team at Hot Docs, helping to oversee the Docs For Schools program, providing free documentary programming for grades 5-15 across Canada. Elspeth has served as the Disability Consultant on the Hot Docs Festival since 2022, assisting the programming team with all disability-related submission, in addition to hosting and moderating a variety of screenings and events. She holds a BA from Innis College at the University of Toronto, where she specialized in Cinema Studies.

Vivian Belik is a documentary programmer, writer and producer who currently works as part of the year-round programming team at TIFF Cinematheque. She has curated and juried works for film festivals across Canada including the Available Light Film Festival, National Screen Institute and Gimli Film Festival and is a graduate of Toronto Metropolitan University’s Documentary Media Program.

Kinga is a film and industry programmer who has been working with film festivals and art institutions for the past 12 years. Most recently she was the Talks & Industry Programmer at the Vancouver International Film Festival as well as the Senior Film Programmer at the Available Light Film Festival. Previously, she has worked with the Victoria Film Festival serving as Head of Programming, curated films for arthouse cinemas in BC and Ontario and run independent filmmaking programs for youth. Her film festival career began with the programming team at the Zurich Film Festival in 2012. She holds an MFA in Media and Film Studies from École Supérieure de Commerce de Paris and MFA in Political Science and International Relations from the University of Lodz. Kinga lives on the traditional lands of the Songhees, Esquimalt and W̱SÁNEĆ people, also knows as Victoria, with her husband, daughter and a golden pup named Pepper.

Julian Carrington is a film programmer, creative analyst, and a racial equity advocate based in Toronto. He is currently Managing Director of the Racial Equity Media Collective (REMC), a non-profit organization committed to equity for Black, Indigenous, and People of Colour (BIPOC) creators in Canada’s film, television, and digital media industries. He is also a Senior Programmer with Toronto’s Planet In Focus Environmental Film Festival. Previously, he served as Senior Industry Manager at Hot Docs, and as a Programming Associate at the Toronto International Film Festival.

Lauren is a film programmer and researcher originally from Treaty 13 Territory/Toronto and based in Glasgow. She holds a B.A. Hons in Cinema Studies and Political Science from the University of Toronto and an MSc in Film, Exhibition and Curation from the University of Edinburgh. Since 2017, she has worked with Toronto International Film Festival and is currently the Documentary Programming Associate. She has worked as an Industry Programmer at Hot Docs overseeing the Deal Maker program and Close Up Sessions and is part of the selection for Glasgow Film Festival and Glasgow Short Film Festival. She is also a member of Invisible Women, which is an archive activist film collective which champions the work of women and filmmakers with marginalised identities from the history of cinema through screenings, events and editorial. In addition to this she has worked as researcher and distribution consultant on multiple documentaries.

Simone Estrin (she/ her) is a Toronto-based programmer, curator, and filmmaker whose work questions the experience of art and its value for society. In addition to her role at Hot Docs, she contributes to film programming at the Toronto International Film Festival and Le Festival International du Film sur l'Art.

Hawa Essuman is a writer and director who began by directing theatre and TV drama. Her deep interest in films and growing the film community is reflected in her participation on juries and selection committees, including for the Warsaw Film Festival, the Africa Movie Awards, FESPACO, the Kigali International Film Festival, and IDFA. She’s also the co-founder and Artistic Director of Manyatta Screenings - an outdoor screening program of short films from greater East Africa aimed at showcasing shorts, creating a meeting point for filmmakers and inspiring audience debate. She also supports and grows the next generation of young African filmmakers by mentoring, running master classes, workshops and panels on filmmaking across the continent, most recently acting as Script Writing mentor for the Deutsche Welle Akademie Film Development program and the One Fine Day Pix Scriptwriting class. She recently taught a seminar on story at the DFFB - the German Film and Television Academy in Berlin.

Gugi is currently based in Jakarta and Berlin, serving as the Program Director for In-Docs, the award-winning non-profit organization behind initiatives like Docs by the Sea, Good Pitch Indonesia, and VitaminDocs. Since 2022, he has been elected to the Executive Board of the Documentary Association of Europe (DAE), and has joined Hot Docs as one of the International Film Programmers. His work encompasses mentoring and consulting stories and rough cuts on projects and impact campaign strategies, and he frequently delivers talks on equitable international co-production practices, with a focus on Asia. Gugi's extensive experience includes serving on selection committees for several prestigious film funds, such as the IDA Enterprise Fund, Chicken & Egg Pictures, IDFA Bertha Fund, Purin Pictures, and SGIFF Film Fund. He has also been a jury member for DOK Leipzig, Cannes Docs, IDFA Forum, Montreal International Documentary Festival (RIDM), CPH:DOX, Dokufest, Ji.hlava IDFF, and more. 

Vicci Ho is a New Zealand-based festival programmer and consultant who has worked at festivals around the world since 2006, including the Hong Kong Lesbian and Gay Film Festival, Toronto International Film Festival, San Francisco International Film Festival, Seattle Film Festival, Zurich Film Festival, and Toronto Reel Asian International Film Festival. She was most recently the Chinese and East Asian Programmer at Whānau Mārama: New Zealand International Film Festival.

Aisha Jamal is a Toronto-based filmmaker and film programmer. She has been programming Canadian films at Hot Docs since 2016. Her directorial debut "A Kandahar Away" premiered in 2019 and her work includes the award-winning short documentaries "Seeds of the Past" and the co-directed "The Long Way Home." She is currently working on her second feature. Aisha holds a PhD in German Cinema from the University of Toronto and she teaches film at Sheridan College.

David Knipe is a film programmer, arts administrator and occasional creative with over 9 years of experience in both festival and theatrical spaces. Currently based in Winnipeg, Manitoba, David is thrilled to be returning to Hot Docs as a Festival programmer after two years as the year-round Cinema Programmer of the Hot Docs Ted Rogers Cinema. David has previously held Senior Film Programmer positions at the Gimli International Film Festival and Dave Barber Cinematheque, and has experience in ground-up festival organization, having co-founded the Afro Prairie Film Festival (2018), and served as the Artistic Director of the Gimme Some Truth Documentary Festival from 2017-21. On the production side, David has worked as assistant director on several short films and music videos, and camera operator on a feature film shot in Winnipeg in 2022.

Lucila Moctezuma is a programmer with international film festivals, producer, and consultant to documentary filmmakers and media organizations. Outside of Hot Docs, she is a Programmer of the Documentary Competition for Morelia International FF and Senior Consultant of Artist Programs at Points North where she co-leads the Diane Weyermann Fellowship. She is producer of the documentaries in-progress She Wrestles (Charles Fairbanks) and Regreso/Return (David Barba). Previously, she held senior positions at Chicken & Egg Pictures, UnionDocs, Women Make Movies, the Media Arts Fellowships for The Rockefeller Foundation, and founded the TFI Latin America Fund for Tribeca Film Institute. Originally from Mexico City and based in Brooklyn, she is a 2019 JustFilms Ford Foundation/Rockwood Leadership Institute Fellow and a member of the Documentary Branch of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences since 2021. 

Gabor Pertic attended the University of Toronto as a Specialist in Cinema Studies, graduating with an Honours B.A. After working as a film critic in Toronto, he transitioned into the world of film festival programming. For several years, he worked in the programming department of the Toronto International Film Festival. In addition to TIFF, Gabor was Executive Director of the Breakthroughs Film Festival and Documentary programmer for the Reykjavik International Film Festival. For the majority of his career, Gabor has been working in the programming department for North America’s largest Documentary-exclusive film festival Hot Docs.

Alexander Rogalski has been a professional film programmer for more than a decade focusing on documentary and Canadian cinema for festivals across the country including TIFF, Calgary International Film Festival, Victoria Film Festival, Gimme Some Truth, and others. He is the founder of the One Take Super 8 Event, an event started in Regina in 2000 that has spread across North America and produced over a thousand independent films. In addition to working as a film curator, Alex is currently an Outreach consultant with SaskCulture and was previously the Executive Director of PAVED Arts in Saskatoon. He holds a Masters in Communication and Culture from York and Toronto Metropolitan (Ryerson) Universities and a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Film from the University of Regina and has written for publications including POV magazine. 

Born and raised in Tehran, Reza is an Iranian-Canadian film programmer currently based between Toronto, Paris, and Tehran. Since 2017, he has contributed to the programming of several film festivals, including the Toronto International Film Festival, the JAYU Human Rights Film Festival, and the Reelworld Film Festival, with a strong commitment to promoting diverse and inclusive film curation. 

Previously, Reza spent over a decade as a cinematographer, specializing in documentaries and short films that highlight critical social issues such as human rights, injustice, and domestic violence. He is fluent in Farsi and English and is actively developing his French language skills. 

Mariam Zaidi is a filmmaker, film programmer, and arts manager based in Toronto. She has worked on programming teams at the Hot Docs Canadian International Documentary Festival since 2016 and the Toronto Reel Asian International Film Festival since 2020, respectively. Previously, Zaidi was the Executive Director of the Breakthroughs Film Festival. Aside from festival programming, Zaidi has also made short films that have been supported by the National Film Board of Canada, the Ontario Arts Council, the Toronto Arts Council and the CBC. Most recently she worked on the distribution and impact campaigns for the Canadian films, Academy-Award Nominated, To Kill a Tiger (TIFF, 2023) and An Unfinished Journey (Hot Docs, 2024).