Eliane Umuhire

Eliane Umuhire is a Rwandan-French actress and producer, and a Berlinale Talents alumna. She gained international recognition for her performance in Birds Are Singing in Kigali, earning Best Actress awards at Karlovy Vary, Chicago and the New York Polish Film Festival.

Her recent work includes Omen by Baloji, awarded at Cannes 2023, Planet B by Aude Léa Rapin, and A Quiet Place: Day One, alongside Lupita Nyong’o and Djimon Hounsou. She also received Best Actress awards for Bazigaga, a BAFTA-nominated short.

In 2024, she served on the Cannes Critics’ Week jury and co-produced The Face of Resilience, a documentary on Rwandan women 30 years after the genocide. In 2025, she was named patron of the African Pavilion at Cannes and co-founded Sisterhood, an initiative connecting African and European women filmmakers, reinforcing her commitment to women’s voices in cinema.