Leanne Pooley

Leanne Pooley ONZM is a Canadian filmmaker based in Auckland, New Zealand. Pooley was born and raised in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada, she immigrated to New Zealand in the mid-1980s and began working in the New Zealand television and film industry before moving to England where she worked for many of the world's top broadcasters (BBC, Channel 4, PBS, Discovery etc.). She returned to New Zealand in 1997 and started the production company Spacific Films. Her career spans more than 25 years and she has won numerous international awards (including the People's Choice Award for Documentary at the Toronto International Film Festival in 2009). Leanne Pooley was made a New Zealand Arts Laureate in 2011 and an Officer of the New Zealand Order of Merit in the New Year's Honours List 2017. She is a member of The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.

2022 saw Pooley move from directing to producing with three documentaries released. Feature Film "Dame Valerie Adams: More Than Gold", "Beyond Conversion" for TVNZ and "Fightback:Joseph Parker" for streaming platform DAZN.

In 2020 Pooley directed two feature documentaries. "We Need To Talk About A.I." for Universal Pictures and GFC films and "The Girl on the Bridge" for Augusto Entertainment and the NZ Film Commission. The former explores the existential risk and exponential benefits of Artificial General Intelligence. The latter follows suicide survivor and activist Jazz Thornton as she confronts teenage suicide head on.

In 2015 Pooley's animated WW1 Feature "25 April" premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival before screening at film festivals around the world. "25 April" was the first New Zealand movie to be in contention for an Academy Award for animation.

In 2013 Leanne directed Beyond the Edge, a 3D feature film about the 1953 Ascent of Everest by Edmund Hillary and Tensing Norgay. The film was a runner-up for the People's Choice Award for Documentary at the Toronto International Film Festival.

In 2009 Pooley made the documentary The Topp Twins: Untouchable Girls, a theatrical feature about the lives of lesbian, singing, twin sister comedy duo, the Topp Twins. The film has won 21 International Awards including at the Toronto International Film Festival, the Melbourne International Film Festival, the Gothenburg International Film Festival, the Seattle Film Festival, New Doc New York, The Nashville Film Festival and the Florida Film Festival among others. It also won Best Feature at the NZ Film & TV Awards, and reached just under $2 million at the New Zealand box office.

Previous documentaries include; Being Billy Apple released in 2007 about the legendary pop turned conceptual artist who used his own identity to explore the concept of artist as art object and whose idea driven works about branding and 'art and life' broke new ground in London and New York; Shackleton's Captain, a documentary about Frank Worsley, captain of Shackleton's Endurance, The Man Who Has Everything for the American Discovery Network, Kiwi Buddha as seen on National Geographic and Haunting Douglas, described by Variety Magazine as an "Expertly crafted video portrait of modern dancer/choreographer Douglas Wright". Haunting Douglas earned Pooley the "Best Director" award at the 2005 New Zealand Screen Awards. Pooley made The Promise about the life of euthanasia advocate, Leslie Martin, winning the "Best Documentary" award at the 2006 New Zealand Screen Awards. Her documentary Try Revolution explores how rugby was used to help end apartheid in South Africa and featured among others Archbishop Desmond Tutu.

Pooley's production company is Spacific Films based in Auckland, New Zealand.

Leanne serves as a judge for The International Academy of Television Arts & Sciences; EMMY Awards. She has taught documentary at various universities and filmschools and is an active member of the New Zealand Director’s Guild and The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. Leanne lives in Auckland with her husband and two children.