ILLUSTRIOUS JURY

POL DIGGLER

Director, screenwriter and editor. Enthusiast of risky and innovative narratives. Constantly seeking new concepts to surprise and provoke audiences. His projects have achieved 700 awards at more than 1000 festivals including OSCAR, GOYA, BAFTA and MÉLIÈS qualifiers.

ALESSIA GASPARELLA

After graduating in Film Studies at DAMS Torino, she left Italy to continue her training in France. First in Besançon, where she worked as a video reporter, and then in Paris, where she started as a production and distribution assistant for a small independent production company, Insolence Productions. After almost two years, she left the office job to seek more active roles in shoots, specializing as a unit manager and executive producer. After almost a decade in the French capital and nearly 40 projects including shorts, features and television series, she decided to return to Italy to build something more personal in her hometown.

In 2020 she founded AIACE VDA, a cultural association dedicated to promoting cinema, organizing screenings, workshops and training programs for schools and citizens. In 2024 she is one of the founders of Red Sled Films, where she works as a film producer. The year 2025 marks the birth of the Bref International Short Film Festival, where she serves as artistic director and main programmer.

In parallel, she is a programmer for several international festivals around the world: TOHorror Fantastic Film Fest, Tribeca Festival, Fantasia Festival, Ravenna Nightmare, SXSW Texas, and Black History Month Aosta.

What she’s most passionate about are short films and all kinds of shark movies. The cheesier, the better!

SARA LOPO

Sara Lopo is currently Programming Coordinator at MOTELX, as well as feature film and short film programmer, and curator of the Big Bad Wolf section.

Her career in cultural events began as a volunteer organizing small concerts for the Luxembourg Music Club and, subsequently, as an intern at the Kunstenfestivaldesarts in Brussels. During her studies in Communication and Cultural Management, she was part of the coordination team for the artistic festival D’Avril en Mai, as a final course project, and completed internships at the independent cinema distribution and VOD platform UniversCiné Belgium (now Sooner).

Sara is a regular presence at international film markets, such as Berlin’s EFM and Cannes’ MDF, as well as European fantastic film festivals. She has been a jury member at the Sitges International Fantastic Film Festival of Catalunya (Spain) and the Trieste Science+Fiction Festival (Italy). Additionally, she is a feature film programmer for Fantastic Fest (USA) and coordinator of film projects at BIF Market, the genre co-production market in Brussels (Belgium).