Creative Team
WRITER / DIRECTOR / ACTRESS
Rhym Guissé
Hi, I am the writer and director of this project.
El Ghorba is a deeply personal piece of my heart. A love letter to Algeria, to the family who raised me, and to the invisible emotional inheritance carried across generations of diaspora. It is rooted in memories from my own childhood in Algeria - the landscapes, the rituals, the tenderness, the racial tensions, and the feeling of existing between worlds. Visually and cinematically, I want the film to feel like memory itself - textured, intimate, sun-soaked, and emotionally alive. It is important to me that this story gets told, and I want to be the one to tell it.
I am a Los Angeles–based director, actor, and screenwriter whose work explores identity and belonging through emotionally resonant, genre-driven storytelling. My directing credits include projects for Disney/Hulu, UnPrisoned, Vanderpump Villa, Nickelodeon, and the NBA. I was also a 2022 fellow of the Commercial Directors Diversity Program (AICP/DGA). My previous short film, Cartes, premiered at the LA Shorts International Film Festival and went on to screen at Oscar-qualifying festivals including BronzeLens and Pan African Film Festival, later receiving Best Picture nominations at the Septimius Awards and Africa Movie Academy Awards.
Over the years, I’ve worked across countless productions both in front of and behind the camera, but storytelling has always remained at the center of everything I do. El Ghorba feels like the culmination of so many personal and creative threads in my life - a story about memory, displacement, womanhood, and the quiet ways love survives distance.
I am in love with this craft, and I want to tell this story.
CINEMATOGRAPHER
John Gardiner
A Los Angeles-based director of photography, John's career started in the lighting and rigging for theatrical productions and concerts. After earning a BA in Film at Emerson College in Boston, John headed out west to pursue filmmaking. Working with the prestigious Independent Spirit Awards and the Los Angeles Film Festival he fell in love with Independent cinema.
Since picking up a camera he's shot documentaries, short films, features, commercials, live concerts, art exhibits and captured innumerable photographs.
His background in lighting, live music production and theatrical productions gives him the tools to work with technical crews, actors and artists across a wide range of backgrounds.
COMPOSER
Natasha Frank
Natasha Frank is a London-born, Los Angeles–based composer known for her bold contemporary musical style.
Her recent work includes Queerbait, a Netflix-backed project executive produced by Cate Blanchett, and Achiever, premiering at the 2026 SXSW Film Festival.
In addition to her original scores, Natasha has contributed to major productions including One Piece, The Exorcist: Believer, Red, White & Royal Blue, and Death Stranding 2, collaborating with studios and platforms such as Sony, Amazon Prime Video, HBO, Disney+, and Meta.
Natasha is the recipient of the 2023 BMI Composer Award, a two-time BAFTA Scholarship recipient, and was selected for both the 2024 Vancouver International Film Festival Composer/Filmmaker Accelerator and the 2025 SAGindie Film Music Connect Program.
Natasha is an alumna of the University of Oxford and the San Francisco Conservatory of Music.
EDITOR
Maximilien Blanc
Maximilien is an American-French video editor, based in Los Angeles. He was born in London, UK where he first discovered his love of film.
For the past seven years, Maximilien Blanc has edited projects for leading brands including Gillette, Walmart, Toyota, Fox Sports, TNT, MotorTrend, and Meta Elevate. He was one of the lead editors on the HBO series The Shop, produced by LeBron James, which won the 2021 Emmy Award for Outstanding Edited Sports Series. In 2022, he was part of the motion graphics team for the documentary Dreamland: The Burning of Black Wall Street, which received the Emmy Award for Outstanding Graphic Design and Art Direction.
In the film world, Blanc has specialized in short films, most recently editing Sweetbriar, an official selection of the 2025 SXSW Film Festival.