Who would jump on plane and fly 5,600 miles just to get in the movie business? Marie Rouhban would and she actually did do that and now she is a film director. This French/Lebanese woman didn’t just walk onto a movie set at Universal Studios, grab a clipboard, look around at the crew and yell “Action!” She did come prepared though.
After earning a Bachelor’s degree in Economics and a Master’s degree in Management and another Master’s in Marketing and Strategy, Marie realized what she truly wanted to do and set her focus on Hollywood and directing films there. When she landed in California she attended UCLA and received a Certificate of Directing. Since she was obviously very well educated, she could have had a spectacularly successful career in the business world. Why, then, did she say goodbye to the loveliness of Paris to come to a foreign land and direct films?
Marie has always loved films and storytelling; in fact, she had been quite passionate about it since she was a young girl. But when it came time to decide what to do with her life she chose to study business because it seemed to her that it was the stable choice at the time. Her passion for filmmaking cropped up after working seven years in the corporate world and catapulted her across the Atlantic where she would give in to her true calling, which, of course, was directing.
It’s interesting to note that her very first short film, Scrapbooks, became an award winner and also did very well on the film festival circuit. This film was honored to win the Best Script at the Asian World film Festival; Marie wrote the screenplay herself and also directed it. The story is about a young man who is scrapbooking at a table in a public patio. He is lonely and appears to really want companionship especially when two older ladies sit down at a table near him and start catching up.
Scrapbooks was invited to participate in some of the busiest and well-known film festivals in the world: Hollyshorts monthly screening; California Women in Film Festival; French Riviera Film Festival; the LA Shorts International Film Festival and Abbot Kinney Fantastic Film Festival, among others. When someone is passionate about something, there’s really no stopping them.
