Paula Bourgie

Paula Bourgie is a Montréal-born filmmaker and animator, whose character-driven work often lives at the intersection of drama, comedy and mystery. Her precise and composed visual style and whimsical universes are anchored in themes of identity, family, secrets, lies and death. While always grounded in emotional truth, her filmic style is bold and colourful, constructing slightly heightened realities.
Paula graduated from Columbia University’s Film MFA program in 2024. Her thesis film The Loon screened at CUFF (Columbia University Film Festival) in New York and Los Angeles, and won the Adrienne Shelly Award for Female Director, the James Ponsoldt Award for Best Director, the Student Selects, the National Board of Review Student Grant as well as the Best Film Award.
Since September 2024, Paula has been a part of a screenwriting lab in Montréal’s ENH (National Humour School) to develop a dramedy series about the world of singing telegrams. She is also developing a feature-film script she hopes to direct in coming years. Alongside her writing projects, Paula is completing her stop-motion short The Undertaker’s Daughter, a fairy tale about life and death she conceptualized, directed and animated during the pandemic.