Paul Swadel

Paul Swadel is a New Zealand film director and producer.

He has directed and or produced many successful short films which have screened in competition at Cannes, Venice, New York and Sundance film festivals to name but a few. Saatchi & Saatchi spotted his talent early in the commercials world for their New Directors Showcase at Cannes in 2000. As a TV Commercial director he has done award-winning work for Sony, Nike and had his Playstation work picked up globally.

Paul has nurtured a filmmaking partnership with James Cunningham (Director) that spans 14 years and three globally successful short films. Their Film Infection competed at Cannes International Film Festival 2000, Sundance Film Festival 2001 and 20 other international Film Festivals. Paul and James have been developing an indie performance capture driven CGI film Marshal with Mark Ordesky, Executive Producer of The Lord of the Rings film trilogy, and have recently completed a proof of concept short film Poppy, that was shot on the Weta Digital motion capture soundstage.

Swadel was a Co-Executive Producer of Headstrong with Ant Timpson and Leanne Saunders. Their feature film The Devil Dared Me To had its world premiere at SXSW and screened at over 20 International Film Festivals. They sold it to Wild Bunch for the United Kingdom, Universal for the United States and Boll AG for rest of world. Their second feature film A Song Of Good began its festival run with a World Premiere at Rotterdam Film Festival where it sold out all of it’s screenings. It garnered 5 nominations at the 2008 New Zealand Screen Awards, and won a Best Picture Award.

Swadel has also directed a significant number of award-winning art documentaries around the world. These range in subject from Placido Domingo at the NY Metropolitan Opera – The Understudy, to an award winning six-hour series on the history of New Zealand Art – The Big Picture presented by Hamish Keith, which garnered 3 nominations at the 2008 New Zealand Screen Awards, and won Best Series and Best Music Awards.

Paul Swadel has a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Film from the University of Canterbury and a Master of Fine Arts with First Class Honours from the Elam School of Fine Arts at the University of Auckland.

Swadel is currently filling the role of Development Executive with the New Zealand Film Commission in Wellington, New Zealand.