Merass Sadek

User Bio

Born in 1981 in Beirut, Merass Sadek completed an undergraduate degree at L’IESAV (Institut d'études scéniques audiovisuelles et cinématographiques) in the Université Saint-Joseph, before undertaking a Masters at the Sorbonne in Paris. His appetite for travel and learning led to a workshop in New York Film Academy, where Merass seized the opportunity to direct and produce Four Break-ups, a short movie shot on 16-mm film.
This marked the start of an 11 year career that in the past few years has included working as:
· Assistant and casting director on 'Le Temps de la Balle', a French production directed by Hervé Jakubowicz (casting director on films such as Babel, Biutiful and the upcoming War Horse)
· Assistant Director in Jocelyne Saab’s feature 'What’s Going On?'
· Casting director and within the directing department for the groundbreaking Emmy-award winning web series 'Shankaboot' (co-produced by Lebanese Batoota Films and BBC worldwide)
· One of the assistant directors to acclaimed Lebanese director Nadine Labaki's second feature film 'Where Do We Go Now?' (selected for the Un Certain Regard section at the 2011 Cannes Film Festival)
In addition to short and feature-length narrative films, Merass has produced and directed commercials and corporate films for clients such as the government of Saudi Arabia, Red Bull, Bticcino and the United Nations.
As well as this, Merass has been cited in recent press articles as the "up and coming indie music video director" to watch given the recent string of music videos he has directed and shot. These include working with cinematographer-turned-director Damoun Ghaoui, on an ultra-artistic portrait piece for an electronic/underground musician named Munma, shooting the video of 'General Suleiman' an alternative group Zeid and the Wings directed by Gigi Roccati that led to more than 60,000 views in a matter of months and, recently shooting and editing another video for Zeid and the Wings for their latest single ‘Asfeh’ again directed by Gigi Roccati that was shot in Italy. However it is his directorial style is most evident on the recently released video of a track called ‘Traditions’ a collaboration between a New York hip-hop outfit called Lo Frequency and a local Lebanese band.
Merass most recent work was a documentary about the Redbull Music Academy held in Beirut during the spring that brought an eclectic group of talented musicians and artists from all around the world together with established pioneers of the industry such as Jazzy B and Peter Zinovieff.