Cannes Camera d'Or Winner Marie-Clementine Dusabejambo Signs With CAA

Marie-Clementine Dusabejambo, the Rwandan filmmaker whose debut feature "Ben'imana" won the Camera d'Or at Cannes this year, has signed with CAA, the agency confirmed.

The Camera d'Or (the Cannes prize for best first feature anywhere across the festival's programs) capped a historic run. "Ben'imana" also took the Fipresci Prize (the critics' award) in the Un Certain Regard strand at the festival's 2026 edition. It was the first film by a Rwandan director ever selected for the Cannes Official Selection.

Why the CAA signing matters

For a self-taught filmmaker from Kigali, agency representation in Los Angeles is a signal, not just paperwork. It comes as "Ben'imana" keeps accumulating milestones:

• Rwanda chose it as the country's first-ever entry in the best international feature race at the 99th Academy Awards.
• The film landed a best international feature nomination at the Gotham Film Awards.
• After Cannes, it screened at Toronto, the BFI London Film Festival and AFI Fest.

So what does this change for Dusabejambo? A major agency typically opens doors to English-language projects, financing partners and Hollywood collaborators — leverage that few Rwandan directors have ever had.

A film ten years in the making

"Ben'imana" took a decade to complete. It's a co-production between Rwanda and Gabon, with France and Norway also on board, and 90% of its crew came from Rwanda's local film industry — a figure that matters for a national cinema still building its infrastructure.

MK2 is handling international sales, while Alexander holds U.K. and U.S. distribution rights. For Alexander, the film also serves as the first title from its newly launched film division — a company betting its launch on a Rwandan debut.

From neighborhood collective to Cannes

Dusabejambo was born in Kigali and grew up there. She taught herself filmmaking, joining a neighborhood collective of young filmmakers in 2008.

Two years later, she won a Tribeca Film Institute screenwriting competition, which led to her first short, "Lyiza." It premiered at Tribeca in 2011 and won the Bronze Tanit at Carthage the following year. Her later shorts, "A Place for Myself" and "Icyasha," traveled the international festival circuit and collected a string of awards.

Her credits extend beyond writing and directing. She served as an archivist on "Why We Hate," the documentary series produced by Steven Spielberg and Alex Gibney, and worked as assistant director on "Faces We Lost."

Dusabejambo remains represented by Paris-based attorney Béatrice Roig of Cabinet Béatrice Roig.

With an Oscar campaign underway and a major agency now behind her, the director who spent ten years on her first feature is positioned to move considerably faster on her second.