Marcel Mettelsiefen

Director · Writer · Cast

Marcel Mettelsiefen is a multi award-winning director, camera operator, photographer and producer. In 2017, Mettelsiefen was nominated for an Academy Award® in the Best Documentary Short Subject category for Watani: My Homeland at the 89th Academy Awards. He also won three EMMY Awards and two BAFTA, among other recognition. His films on the Syrian civil war such as Syria: Children on the Frontline (2014), Children on the Frontline: The Escape(2016) and Watani: My Homeland (2016) have earned him critical appraisal and recognition. Mettelsiefen studied political science and medicine at Humboldt University in Berlin. In his twenties, he worked as a photo-journalist, and has reported from throughout the Middle East and Afghanistan. He is the co-founder of the magazine, Zenith, one of the leading publications on the Middle East and the Arab world in Germany. Since 2011, Mettelsiefen has been covering the Arab Spring and began reporting from within Syria in April 2011. Since then he has filmed and photographed within Syria more than twenty-five times. It was in Syria that he began documentary film-making. His documentaries from Syria have been aired on ARD, ZDF, Channel4, CNN, Al Jazeera and Canal+, ARTE and others. Together with Mayte Carrasco (co-director) and Stephen Ellis (editor) he recently finished Afghanistan, the Wounded Land, a 4x52 Documentary Series, In co production with ARTE, NDR and Al Jazeera. Mettelsiefen is co-owner and chairman of production company Unscrypt.