María Lourdes Cortés

(Costa Rica) is a film academic, general director of the Costarican Center for Film Production and chairwoman of FUNDACINE, a funding body that supports and stimulates audiovisual productions made in Central America and the Carribean. She studied in Paris at the Sorbonne and is expert in the field of screen adaption of Latin American novels. She is a tutor and academic attached to the University of Costa Rica and to the private School of Film and Television. Cortés was involved in the production of the films El Dorado and Eulalia. Alongside that she produced many documentaries, commercials and video clips for Costarican companies. From 1994 to 1998 she worked as adviser for the minister for cultural affairs at the Costa Rican embassy in France. During this period she organised the project Les Belles Etrangeres, that in 1997 was dedicated to Central American literature. Cortés wrote various books and articles for professional film and communication journals.