Jean-Michel Dissard

Movies

I Learn America
Director
The children of immigration, here to stay, are the new Americans. How we fare in welcoming them will determine the nature of this country in the 21st century and beyond. The International High School is a New York City public school dedicated to serving newly arrived immigrant teenagers, with more than 300 students speaking two-dozen languages from 50 countries. The students strive to master English, adapt to families they haven't seen in years, confront the universal trials of adolescence, and search for a future they can claim as their own. In "I Learn America," five resilient immigrant teenagers come together over a year at the International High School at Lafayette and struggle to learn their new land. Through these five vibrant young people, their stories and struggles, and their willingness to open their lives and share them with us, we "learn America."
Down to the Bone
Additional Writing
A woman stuck in a stale marriage struggles to raise her children and manage her secret drug habit. But when winter comes to her small town, her balancing act begins to come crashing down.
Down to the Bone
Producer
A woman stuck in a stale marriage struggles to raise her children and manage her secret drug habit. But when winter comes to her small town, her balancing act begins to come crashing down.
Nowhere to Go But Up
Associate Producer
Val is 23 years old and full of dreams. She travels to New York to become an actress. She is lonely in a strange country, in a strange city, with little money and no friends. In her path, she meets weird people who they, also, seek their dreams but everyday life gets in the way. Tired and hungry she sits on the corner of a building. Across the street a writer whose fantasy has dry out. In an instant she becomes his muse... At the Oscar's night she will be the one with the Golden Globe in her hands.
Raising Victor Vargas
Associate Producer
The film follows Victor, a Lower East Side teenager, as he deals with his eccentric family, including his strict grandmother, his bratty sister, and a younger brother who completely idolizes him. Along the way he tries to win the affections of Judy, who is very careful and calculating when it comes to how she deals with men.