Yasmine Benkiran was raised in Morocco. At the age of 18, she moved to Paris to study philosophy and communications, after which she attended a scriptwriting workshop at La Fémis. Now a screenwriter, she writes for both cinema and television. She is also the author of two books on Morocco and a podcast series, and she works as a script consultant for numerous organizations and on various productions. Her first feature film as director, Queens (2022), is a truck ride through the Moroccan Atlas Mountains. It had its world premiere in the Settimana Internazionale della Critica section of the Venice International Film Festival, and went on to win numerous festival awards before its theatrical release.