bio

Andre Balbuena is a director and writer based in Lima, Peru. He wrote and directed his debut musical short film “A First Date” in 2019 which won a Best Sound award in a local film festival and screened nationally in three more. Likewise, during his time at the University of Lima studying Communication, he directed the short film “A Good Lawyer”, a screenplay adapted from an original microtreathre play, which also made its way into a national film festival and now has over 100k views on YouTube.

Before heading into Communication, Andre studied Systems Engineering, a background which has given him the confidence to explore the worlds of post production, artificial intelligence, and video games. It has also boosted his interest in the intersection between the narratives of cinema and video games.

During his teenage years, Andre voluntereed as youth pastor and camera operator in two Evangelical Christian churches in Lima. These experiences fueled his leadership skills which have seamlesly transferred to professional filmmaking. Futhermore, he is now interested in working on nuanced portrayals of Evangelical characters which are lacking in Peruvian fiction as well as capturing the authenticity of religion through film.

Andre has worked in various Peruvian studio films such as “Crazy in Love 3” and “Medias Hermanas” in addition to the Netflix original film “Without Saying Goodbye” and the series “Queen of the South Season 3”.  He has also worked at Tondero, the most succesful production company in Peru, in both the marketing and production departments.

Andre is currently working on the post production of his next short film “Bus”, a dark comedy short film which explores the relationship between selfishness and the traffic of Lima, one of the worst in the world. It already won the CREA Talentos contest by the University of Lima and achieved finalist status in the 2021 National Contest of Short Film Projects of the Ministry of Culture of Peru.