Rosanna Xia is a Pulitzer Prize finalist and an environmental reporter for the Los Angeles Times, where she specializes in stories about the coast and ocean. Her journalism has inspired new laws and regulations, and her celebrated book, “California Against the Sea,” received the PEN/E.O. Wilson Literary Science Writing Award, a gold medal from the California Book Awards, and a “Great Reads from Great Places” citation from the Library of Congress, among other honors. She has been praised for her investigative reporting and narrative storytelling, and her coverage of a toxic dumpsite in the deep ocean has been anthologized in the “Best American Science and Nature Writing” series.
Her most recent project, the feature documentary film “Out of Plain Sight,” is a cinematic expansion of one of Xia’s most haunting environmental exposés.
Please List the Title of Your Film at BIFF 2025
OUT OF PLAIN SIGHT
What was your first experience with film and how did it influence your first project?
Well before I found my calling in environmental journalism, I had dabbled in a number of different writing jobs, including doing script coverage for a studio that specializes in book adaptations. I was riveted by the power of storytelling in this form, and by all the ways a film can visually and emotionally translate a story beyond just the words you see on the page. I’ve been thinking a lot lately about how this experience helped shape my approach and transition into directing a documentary.Who is (are) your favorite filmmakers?
Who are your favorite Filmmakers?
Albert Berger and Ron Yerxa at Bona Fide Productions. They have made (and made possible!) so many of my favorite indie films (Little Miss Sunshine and The Peanut Butter Falcon, just to name a few!) Both Ron and Albert have taught me what it means to truly support and build community through every step of the filmmaking process, and they are the filmmakers who inspired me to finally take the leap into film.
What are you working on that no one knows about?
My next book!
Who would play you in a movie? What’s your go to movie snack? What’s the film title that best describes your life?
1. This one honestly stumped me. I’m open to ideas!
2. Call me an old soul, but I love sneaking in a thermos of tea when I go to the movies (mint tea, chamomile, rooibos, I love all tea!)
3. “An Inconvenient Truth” amplified by “Everything Everywhere All At Once”
