The crew
had worked for years to gain the confidence of the protagonists before the shooting. This allowed the directors to find their place among the Evangelicals and to have an intimate look at them. During the World Cup, several teams were shooting at the same time in order to allow each director to focus on one protagonist.
Lilian Franck
Has been directing and producing films for the international market for more than 10 years. In 2003, she won the French-German prize for young journalist with the movie “Half a Chance”, co-directed by Robert Cibis. The documentary film “Human Capital- The Employment Trade” has been sold in five countries. “Jesus Loves You” is her first feature lenght documentary film for cinema. Lilian studied at the Filmakademie of Baden-Württemberg, at the Grande École Le Fresnoy – Studio National des artes contemporains and at the Discovery Campus Masterschool.
Matthias Luthard
Has studied German and French literature, as well as Rhetoric and Media Culture in Tübingen, Paris and Hamburg. In 1998 he entered the Hochschule für Film und Fernsehen “Konrad Wolf” in Potsdam Babelsgberg where he studied film direction. The same year he met Robert Cibis at the Master class of the Deutsch- Französischen Filmakademie to learn about the production landscape in Europe. Matthias Luthardt has directed several short movies and documentaries as well as the Cannes Festival (Semaine de la Critique) prize winningfeature film “Ping Pong” (2005). For “Jesus Loves You” he worked with the cameraman Lukas Schmid whose film “Intimacies” won the 2003 First Step Award.
Michaela Kirst
Is working as freelance documentary director in New York and Berlin. Her last film “ Between the Lines ” will be broadcasted in 2008 on several European TV channels (RB, Arte and WDR). Together with Robert Cibis and Lilian Franck she produced the documentary series “Disgustingly Healthy” and “The Crusade against Evil”. Now she is working in postproduction on the documentary film “My Deathcleaner and Me”. She has studied History, Psychology and German Language in Cologne and Toulouse.
Robert Cibis
Is the producer and director of several documentary and fiction films. In 2007, his two-parts documentary “Disgustingly Healthy” won the Ekotop Prize. He is now working on thefeature length documentary feature film “Pianomania”. He acquired a great knowledge of European production at the Masterclass of the Deutsch-Französischen Filmakademie in Paris and Baden-Württemberg. Robert is also graduated in Film studies of the universities of Rome and La Sorbonne in Paris.