Directory Profile

Manouchka Kelly Labouba is a director/screenwriter/producer from Gabon (Central Africa). She has written, directed, or produced a dozen of short films, which have been selected in official competition at many African film festivals including FESPACO (Burkina Faso), Carthage (Tunisia), or Vues d’Afrique (Canada). In 2008, she made history by directing her 40min film LE DIVORCE, as she became at age 24, not only the youngest director in the history of her country, but also the first woman to direct fiction there. Her screenplay of LE DIVORCE won a total of €20,000 in screenwriting grants from the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and the Francophonie Organization. The film went on to win Best Directorial Debut in 2009 at the Ecrans Noirs film festival (Cameroon). She holds a Master de Recherche in Arts from the University of Bordeaux 3 (France), and a MA in Critical Studies from the University of Southern California (USA). Since 2010, she has relocated to Los Angeles to develop her first feature film project, while pursuing her doctorate in Cinema Studies still at USC.