Renae Maihi is New Zealand Māori of the Ngapuhi and Te Arawa tribes. She is an award winning writer and director in theatre and film and has had films in various A-list film festivals including Toronto, Berlinale and Sundance.

Her anthology feature film Waru premiered at Toronto International Film Festival in 2017 and went on to win the Grand Jury Award for an Outstanding International Narrative Feature at the 34th Asia Pacific Film Festival in Los Angeles and the “Best of SIFF 2018 Audience Award” at Seattle International Film Festival. Waru further enjoyed success in major NZ cinemas with a ground swell of support from repeat audiences.

In 2022, her recent anthology feature film We Are Still Here premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival and won the Telefilm award for ‘Best Dramatic Feature Film’ at imagineNATIVE Film Festival. In 2023 We Are Still Here had theatrical release across major theatres in Australia and New Zealand and is now on Netflix.

Presently in development with feature film screenplays, Renae is a writer / director dedicated to Indigenous narrative storytelling at the highest level.