Bogdan Apetri

Bogdan Apetri, a Romanian director now based in New York, made his directorial debut with Outbound (Periferic). Funded in part by Romania’s National Centre for Cinema, the film was selected for the New Directors/New Films festival at MoMA and the Lincoln Center, and at the Thessaloniki International Film Festival, it won the top prize, the Best Feature Film Award, as well as the Greek Film Critics Association Award. The film, which Apetri directed and co-wrote, tells the gripping story of Matilda, a prisoner out on furlough who has 24 hours to attend a mother’s funeral, collect on old debts, make amends with her family, and flee. Apetri also coproduced Florin Serbin’s Emigrant and Eric Mendelsohn’s 3 Backyards, which won the Best Directing Award at Sundance. He was nominated for a Student Academy Award in 2006, and his short films have played at Clermont-Ferrand, Rotterdam, and Palm Springs, Cottbus, and Montreal. Before enrolling in the MFA program at Columbia, he worked as a criminal defense lawyer in Romania.