About Us
Laura Bialis
An avid historian and film buff, Laura founded Sirena Films in 1998 as a way to fuse her love of history with her passion for filmmaking. An award-winning documentary filmmaker, her work as producer and director has ranged from documentaries about human rights, poverty, and wartime memories, to commercial projects for clients such as TV Guide Channel and Universal Television.
It was 1999’s TAK FOR ALT – Survival of a Human Spirit, which Laura produced and co-directed with Broderick Fox and Sarah Levy, that first brought Laura’s documentary filmmaking to the attention of viewers across the United States.
The story of Holocaust survivor turned Civil Rights activist Judy Meisel, TAK FOR ALT tells Judy’s story as a young girl coming of age during the Holocaust. The film accompanies Judy, now in her seventies, back to Eastern Europe to re-trace her wartime journey: from the Kovno Ghetto through the Stutthof Concentration Camp, and ultimately on to Denmark, where she was liberated and restored to health by an outpouring of Danish compassion. A remarkable testament to the resilience of Judy’s spirit, TAK FOR ALT also triumphs Judy’s personal journey from Holocaust victim to American Civil Rights activist.
In 2000, TAK FOR ALT won the Anti-Defamation League’s Dore Schary Award. The film enjoyed brief theatrical distribution, and aired on PBS in many major markets with a prime-time premiere on Holocaust Remembrance Day in 2000. The film was honored by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences as “one of the outstanding films of 1999” and was included in their prestigious Contemporary Documentary Screening Series. The film is now being used by teachers in over thirty states, and has been implemented into history curricula in many school districts.
Laura’s other work includes Daybreak Berlin, a narrative short based on the wartime memoirs of Ilse-Margret Vogel, a German artist and anti-Nazi resister living underground in Berlin during WWII, and Bread, a short documentary about hunger in Los Angeles, which was commissioned by the Los Angeles Regional Food Bank.
Laura recently completed View From the Bridge: Stories from Kosovo, the first feature documentary ever made on the war-torn province, and is finishing post-production on Refusenik, a groundbreaking feature-length documentary about the 30-year international human rights campaign to free Soviet Jewry.
Laura graduated from Stanford University with a B.A. in History in 1995, where she focused on wartime and post-war Europe. She also holds an M.F.A. in Production from the USC School of Cinema-Television.
John Ealer
John is a Los Angeles-based Director / Cinematographer for commercials, features and television. His recent cinematographer credits include the feature films Hacia La Oscuridad (2007, starring America Ferrera) and The Mostly Unfabulous Social Life of Ethan Green (2006, Regent Releasing), the interactive Shuttle Launch Experience for Kennedy Space Center, the television pilot Kamen Rider, as well as countless other TV shows for the History Channel, The Food Network, among many others.
Another recent work, Ford Motor Company’s seven-screen multi-sensory film “The Art of Manufacturing,” recently opened to rave reviews at the new Henry Ford Rouge Museum in Dearborn, Michigan. In 2004, John shot Unjoined at the Hip, a first-of-its-kind documentary about a conjoined twins separation surgery. John enjoyed unprecedented access to the surgical suite for the entire 26-hour operation, enabling him to capture the incredible determination that went into — and profound joy that resulted from — this successful procedure. One, a short film that John lensed, won the Online Audience Award at the 2003 Sundance Film Festival.
John’s diverse director credits include promo campaigns for ABC, including the ProMax Award-Winning Secrets for the show Port Charles and All My Children’s Search for the Sexiest Man in America. John also won an Addy award for the Anti-Smoking Campaign, Money to Burn. John’s narrative work includes the successful short films The Lottery Ticket, featured at the Slamdance Online Festival in 2000, and the award-winning Tigers Made in Heaven.
John began his career as a cinematographer after receiving his MFA in Film Production from the University of Southern California School of Cinema-Television in 1999.
