Filmmaker Natalie Johns has a passion for social issues and creating social change through media and entertainment. Johns was born in Zimbabwe, grew up in South Africa, and moved to London in 1997 to begin a career specializing in live entertainment television and documentary film. In 2013, she moved to Los Angeles, where she now resides.
Johns found her passion for filmmaking through a love of music; songs put into words what Johns could not. Growing up in South Africa she was deeply affected by the disparity in the world around her. She studied film in Durban, South Africa at Natal Technicon with the desire to create images for music but was drawn to documentary by stories of journalists who were instrumental in ending the war in Vietnam and Apartheid in South Africa. After graduating in 1997, she began her career capturing the live experience of music and this evolved into the desire to create experiences and connect story to audiences, raise awareness or simply help people to better understand one another. Creating moving portraits of the people she works with, Johns cares about the ‘experience' and seeks out the humanity in every story.
Johns has directed and produced many music for film projects around the world and large scale international campaigns for the likes of Amnesty International including "Electric Burma", a film for television and live concert event honoring Aung San Suu Kyi with Bono and "Bring Human Rights Home" a campaign staged to coincide with Pussy Riot's release from Russian prison and visit to the US featuring Imagine Dragons, Lauren Hill, Flaming Lips, Madonna and many more.
Commercial clients have included iTunes, Rock the Vote, Nike, Coca-Cola, Spotify. Peace One Day and socially disruptive grassroots campaigns with The Yes Men.
Accolades include a Billboard Women in Music nomination in 2010 and an OMMA Award for the Pitch Perfect documentary web series. "Music for RAIN", an artistic collaboration for Coca Cola's Replenish Africa Initiative, devoted to supplying clean water to Africans, conceived by Johns received a Gold at the Digital Impact Awards.
Natalie focuses on human interest stories in her documentary work. Her film "I Am Thalente" follows once homeless South African skateboarder Thalente Biyela from the streets of South Africa to California on a skateboard. "If I Ventured in the Slipstream" is an impressionistic take on independent music and it's future and she is currently in development on a documentary with John Legend and his "#FREEAMERICA" campaign to end mass incarceration.

Source : I AM THALENTE Press kit 2015