Brillante Mendoza is a Philippine director and producer. His films have competed and won in the three major international film festivals—the Cannes Film Festival, the Venice Film Festival and the Berlin International Film Festival; in Berlin, Tirador (2007) won the Caligari Film Award, while in Venice, Lola (2009) was nominated for the coveted Golden Lion and Thy Womb (2012) won the La Navicella Venezia Cinema Award and the Bisato d’ Oro Award. He is the first Filipino to receive the Best Director award in Cannes for his film Kinatay in 2009. Ms. Jaclyn Jose won the Best Actress award in Cannes for his film Ma’ Rosa in 2016, a first such win for the Philippines and Southeast Asia.

He is also the first Filipino to receive France's "Chevalier dans l'Ordre des Arts et Lettres" (Knight of the Order of Arts and Letters) in 2014.

For more than 10 years, Mendoza worked as one of the most sought-after freelance production designers in advertising; he had projects with multinational and local corporations such as Unilever, P&G, McDonald’s, Jollibee, PLDT, Globe and numerous other agencies. After this, he directed his first feature film, Masahista, which won Locarno Film Festival’s Golden Leopard (video competition) in 2005. Since then, his works have received awards and nominations from other top-tier film festivals around the world. He is the only Filipino director to have an exhibit at the Metropolitan Museum of Manila in 2016, and is considered as the first living Filipino and Asian filmmaker who has been given retrospectives in major European cities, Scandanavian countries, Latin America, North America and Asia. Mendoza is currently ranked as the 97th most awarded film director in the world.

A few of his most memorable competition films are Motherland (2024), Moro (2023), Feast (2022), Gensan Punch (2021), Mindanao (2019), Alpha: The Right to Kill (2018), Trap (2015), Captive (2012) and Service (2008). Mindanao received the Henry Barakat Best Artistic Contribution and Best Actress awards at Cairo International Film Festival, while Alpha: The Right to Kill took home the Special Jury Prize at the San Sebastian International Film Festival in 2018. Ma’ Rosa, Mindanao and Verdict (2019), which he produced, were submitted as Philippines’ entries to the Academy Awards’ Best International Feature Film category. Trap won the Ecumenical Jury Prize in Cannes in 2015, and Service was the first Filipino film in 28 years to compete for the Palme d’Or. Mendoza created Amo (2018), the first Philippine crime drama on Netflix. Gensan Punch, which won Busan International Film Festival’s Kim Ji Seok Award, is streamed by HBO and Resbak (2021) is in Prime Video. Feast and Moro are also available on Netflix.

As his works have triumphantly represented the Philippines, Mendoza has also shared his insights and expertise globally by consistently serving as juror and jury president in several relevant film festivals such as those held in Japan, Russia, Switzerland, Egypt, China, France, Malaysia, Singapore, India, Belgium and many others; he was jury president at the Tokyo International Film Festival and Malaysia International Film Festival in 2018, and served as juror in Iran’s 38th Fajr International Film Festival (2020) and jury chairman in Russia’s 43rd Moscow International Film Festival (2021). In 2024 he also headed the jury at Morocco’s Festival International du Cinema D’Author de Rabat, and at the Cinema at Sea - Okinawa Pan-Pacific International Film Festival in early 2025.

Mendoza’s works are mainly focused on social issues and aim to highlight and vigorously promote Philippine stories and culture internationally. For almost two decades and to this day Mendoza has been a strong supporter of young Filipino filmmakers and an advocate of film literacy in the Philippines. He has established a film foundation, founded a film festival and has continuously conducted filmmaking workshops, working with government and educational institutions all over the country — efforts which have succeeded in changing perspectives, inspiring and producing a new generation of highly skilled artists.