Marina Danezi is a producer and director best known for Sam Roma: Eimaste Tsigganoi (2014), Scavengers’ Union (2011) and The Trap (2011). Danezi was born in 1982 in Athens, Greece. She studied mathematics at the University of Athens and drama at Delos, Demetra Hatoupi’s school.

In 2016, she was the second unit director on the documentary by Nikos Triantafyllidis, PAOK 90 years: Longing for the Future, which won the Pan-Hellenic Film Critics Association award at Thessaloniki International Film Festival.

In 2008 she directed her first documentary, The Pirate of Time, which received an honourable mention in the 2008 Digi Awards at the International Short Film Festival in Drama, followed by her second short documentary The Trap in 2009. A year later she directed her first feature documentary, Scavengers’ Association, which the Hellenic Film Academy nominated for Documentary of the Year at the 5th Documentary Festival Docfest Chalkida; it went on to receive an honourable mention. Sam Roma (2014) is her second feature documentary.

As the director of Sam Roma she illustrates the conflict between the perception of the Roma (both in terms of culture and history) and the reality of their everyday lives. The film juxtaposes myths about Roma and explores the negative aspects that society sees in order to illustrate that Roma are people like everyone else, regardless of what is believed to be true. Her direction explores the simple, beautiful life of Roma in Greece.

In addition to her work as a producer and director, Marina Danezi is the artistic director of Gagarin 205 Live Music Space, one of the top venues in Athens, which hosts highly important and interesting gigs by both international and Greek artists.

Filmography / Awards

2016 PAOK 90 years: Longing for the Future, received the Greek Film Critics’ Association PEKK award

2014 The Haunts: Stories of Vulgar Culture

2014 Sam Roma: Eimaste Tsigganoi / Sam Roma: We Are Gypsies

2010 Somateio rakosyllekton (Scavengers’ Association)

2009 The Trap, nominated at the 5th Documentary Festival Docfest Chalkida

2008 The Pirate of Time, honourable mention in the 2008 Digi Awards at the International Short Film Festival in Drama