Melanie Shatzky and Brian M. Cassidy are a collaborative artistic duo, blending documentary and narrative cinema to create unique and thought-provoking films.
Their cinematic endeavors have garnered widespread recognition, with screenings at prestigious film festivals such as Sundance, Berlin, Toronto, Locarno, and Rotterdam, as well as prominent museums and galleries like the Museum of Modern Art, the National Gallery of Art, Le Musée de la Civilisation, ICA London, the Museum of the Moving Image, the Rio de Janeiro Museum of Modern Art, and Lincoln Center.
Shatzky & Cassidy have also been the recipients of numerousships fellow, including those from MacDowell, Yaddo, and IFP. Their remarkable work has earned them numerous awards and nominations, including a Gotham Award nomination for Breakthrough Director in 2012.
Their feature debut, Francine, starring Academy Award winner Melissa Leo, was met with critical acclaim, with The Hollywood Reporter describing it as "raw, intimate, and observed with penetrating acuity." The film was also selected as a New York Times Critic's Pick.
Their documentary, The Patron Saints, was praised by POV Magazine as "one of the most powerful Canadian documentaries of recent years."
In addition to their filmmaking endeavors, Shatzky & Cassidy are also accomplished photographers, with their work featured in prominent publications such as GUP Magazine, Der Greif, ZEITmagazin, It's Nice That, Wired, FlakPhoto, and Slate.
In 2015, the Montreal International Documentary Festival (RIDM) invited the duo to curate a special program, "A Photographer's Eye: Photography & The Poetic Documentary," which explored the intersection of photography and documentary film. The program was showcased at La Cinémathèque Québécoise.
Both Shatzky & Cassidy hold an MFA from The School of Visual Arts in NYC, and their artistic collaborations continue to push the boundaries of storytelling and visual expression.
