Mizuko YAMAOKA was born in Tokyo in 1974, moved to New York in 1998 and obtained her Bachelor of Fine Arts degree from Pratt Institute in 2002. Due to an accident that paralyzed her legs, she had to return to Japan. After a long break, she then went to Denmark for ten months to learn cinematography and editing. Afterwards, she studied documentary film at the Film School of Tokyo. In 2016, she shot her first short film THE LOST COIN in Barcelona. MAELSTROM is her feature-length debut.