Bio.

CJ will be serving as President of the Jury of International Film Critics for the Main Competition at the Cannes Film Festival in May 2025.

CJ has been a popular voice on ABC Radio since 2009. Currently he appears regularly on three flagship programs: as the resident film critic for Afternoons With James Valentine, A regular film segment on Evenings With Renee Krosch and on The CJ Film Hour on Nightlife With Suzanne Hill on ABC Radio.

CJ lectures monthly on cinema at the Art Gallery of New South Wales. He is in demand as a speaker, host and moderator, with clients including private clubs in Sydney, distributors and cinema chains including Dendy Cinemas and the Ritz Cinema, and cultural groups such as Cinema Reborn and The Italian Cultural Institute.

CJ is also an international tour leader. He recently led The Art Gallery of New South Wales’ Cinematic Journey from Lyon to Paris, will be leading a tour for the Gallery to Los Angeles in late 2025, and, beginning in 2026, will be the resident expert speaker on Regent and Oceania Cruises for the Pacific.

He was President for four years, and is currently Vice President, of the Film Critics Circle of Australia (FCCA); a member of the International Federation of Film Critics (FIPRESCI); and Head Lecturer in Cinema Studies at Sydney Film School (SFS). He served on the Jury of the 47th Norwegian International Film Festival in 2019 and the Oberhausen Short Film Festival in 2023.

CJ’s short films include The Bris which premiered as part of Cinema Des Antipodes at the 2010 Cannes Film Festival; Saturday Night Newtown Sunday Morning Enmore (Winner, Best Film: 14th Independents’ Film Festival, Florida 2007; 12th Canberra Short Film Festival 2007; 7th Bondi Short Film Festival 2007); Festival favourite and multiple Best Film runner-up The Game; Do Not Pass Go; Spring Bride and Pass The Salt. He co-directed the 2009 feature film Before The Rain.

CJ’s plays as writer include The Dog Logs, The Young Tycoons, Hollywood Ending, La La Land, Backpacker and Barnesy The Harbour and You. They have been performed in every state and territory of Australia, on Norfolk Island, and in New York, Bangalore, London, Zagreb, Tallin (Estonia), Belgrade and dozens of other towns and cities. His one-man show Kinski and I won the Sydney Fringe Theatre Award 2014.

He has studied at Brown University, The American Repertory Theatre Institute of Advanced Theatre Training at Harvard University, the National Institute of Dramatic Art (NIDA) and the Australian Film, Television and Radio School (AFTRS).