María Luisa Novaro Peñaloza (September 11, 1951, in Mexico City), better known as María Novaro, is a Mexican film director. She was among the first generation of female filmmakers to graduate from a film school in Mexico. She has made five feature films and fourteen short films. Within the Mexican film industry, she has been a cinematographer, sound mixer, director, screenwriter and editor. Today, Novaro is one of the best known Mexican filmmakers to come out of the New Mexican Cinema and her films express Millian's idea of cinema in feminine.