Cyril Aris is a Lebanese Director & Screenwriter. His debut feature documentary, The Swing (2018) premiered in competition at the Karlovy Vary IFF, receiving positive reviews with The Hollywood Reporter calling it ‘Intimate and moving’, in ‘this meditation on truth, love and lies in the face of illness and death’. It won the El-Gouna Bronze Star Award, the jury award at Rome's Medfilm Festival, and an honorable mention at London’s Open City Docs.    His last fiction short film, The President’s Visit (2017), premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF), won the US National Board of Review (NBR) grant award, was shortlisted for a student BAFTA, won the Muhr Jury Prize at the Dubai IFF, and the oscar-qualifying grand jury prize at the Nashville Film Festival. It played in over 50 film festivals worldwide.    Previous credits include short film Siham (2013), jury award at the Palm Springs ShortFest, LBC’s TV series Beirut, I Love You (2011, 2012), and Yahoo’s web-series Fasateen (2012), which both gathered several million views.     Aris holds an MFA from Columbia University in the City of New York, and has taught Film at Columbia University, NHSI at Northwestern University and Barnard College.