Mark A. Meily is a film director, producer and a film educator who started his career in the Philippines. He has directed campaigns for Procter & Gamble, Colgate-Palmolive, Coca-Cola, DocuSign, and FICO. His feature films have been presented at the film festivals of Deauville, Hawaii, Seattle, Goteborg, Marrakech, Montreal, Busan, Fukuoka and Brussels. He was the chair of the Filmmaking program of the De La Salle-College St. Benilde in Manila. He became the Dean of the School of Design of iAcademy until 2019. On May,2019, his tenth feature, Maledicto, the first film produced by Fox International in the Philippines opened in cinemas. He now lives in San Francisco.
Meily took up Visual Communications at the University of the Philippines before studying film at Mowelfund in Manila and in Paris at l"ESEC as a French Government Scholar for cinema. He wrote and directed Crying Ladies and La Visa Loca. These films were shown and have won awards in many international film festivals from Montreal to Kerala. Crying Ladies received the NETPAC Award and the Best Director prize at the International Film Festival of Kerala, India. It had a theatrical run in the US and was positively reviewed by the New York Times, the LA Times, and the Village Voice. His third film Baler won 10 awards at the Metro Manila Film Festival and was exhibited at the MoMA in New York in 2009. His television sit-com Camera Café won the Best Comedy Program at the Asian TV Awards in Singapore. His new film Donor won 5 awards at the 6th Cinemalaya Film Festival including Best Film in Manila. It also won the Grand Prize at the 30th Brussels Independent Film Festival. The film is in the official selection at the Pusan, Hawaii Goteborg, Seattle, Marrakesh International Film Festivals, and the Deauville Asian Film Festival. He has taught film at the De La Salle University, the Marilou Diaz-Abaya Film Institute, and the Assumption College. He won the Palanca Literary Prize in 2001 and 2004. He was the chair of the Filmmaking program of the De La Salle-College St. Benilde in Manila. In 2008, he co-founded Spark Digital Content, an interactive design studio and production company.
Television
In 2008, Meily directed the pilot week episode of Judy Ann Santos' Habang May Buhay. He also wrote episodes and directed all six-seasons of the Asian adaptation of the hit French Sit-Com Camera Café. The series won Best Comedy Series at the Asian Television Awards in Singapore. He recently, finished the hit drama series Jasmine for TV5. For his television work, he won numerous awards such as the Catholic Mass Media Award, the Anvil Award, and the Philippine Advertising Creative Guild Prize. He is also the recipient of several awards from the Philippine Advertising Congress.
Writing
Meily has written two screenplays, Bayad Luha and The Good Friday Archipelago, which have won prizes from the Don Carlos Palanca Memorial Foundation annual literary contest.
Critical success
Meily directed Crying Ladies, his first feature film. The film won six awards at the 2003 Metro Manila Film Festival including Best Picture and Best Director. The film also received several nominations from different award-giving bodies in Philippines. Crying Ladies premiered in the United States and has received good reviews from the New York Times, Los Angeles Times, and The Village Voice. It has also been shown at the Montreal World Film Festival, Brussels Festival of Independent Cinema, Hamburg Film Festival, Newport Beach Film Festival, Dallas Asian Film Festival, Calcutta Film Festival, and Palm Springs Film Festival. The film received the NETPAC Award for Best Asian Film and awarded for Meily the Best Director prize at the International Film Festival of Kerala, India. It is also the Philippine entry to the Best Foreign Language Film at the Academy Awards of the United States. Meily also directed Pasyon U.S.A., a film largely based on his Palanca–prize winning screenplay Good Friday Archipelago. In December 2008, his third feature, Baler topped the Metro Manila Film Festival garnering 11 awards and earning Meily his second Best Director trophy. Baler, a historical epic drama set during the end of the war of Independence in the Philippines, was screened later on at the Far East Film Festival in Udine and was the opening film of the Indio Bravo Film Festival at the Museum of Modern Art in New York. Meily also won another Best Director trophy at the PMPC Star Awards in 2009. Mark Meily founded Spark Films, a pioneer in branded viral entertainment and together with CALT, France introduced the hit French sit-com Camera Cafe in Asia. The Asian adaptation of the series eventually won Best Comedy Program at the 2008 Asian Television Awards in Singapore.
