Editing: Sheherzad Kaleem
Musical Score: Daniel, Sarfaraz, Salim Sharif, Tehrik-e-Niswan
Script: Sheherzad Kaleem
Produced and
Directed by: Sheherzad Kaleem

SYNOPSIS
A radical, Karachi-based theatre group (Tehrik-e-Niswan), is storming the streets of Pakistan with its plays on issues such as education, forced marriages and honour killings. Challenging social norms and facing acute opposition, this group, led by a headstrong and rebellious woman, Sheema Kirmani, is focused in its purpose of creating awareness and fighting for women’s equal rights.
The documentary showcases the work of this theatre group in light of the social and historical framework of Pakistan; assesses its impact on the lives of ordinary women and also highlights the personal struggles of some of the theatre actors themselves.

THE FILMMAKER
Sheherzad Kaleem is originally from Pakistan, but has lived in the United States for the last 8 years. She completed her undergraduate degree from the University of Virginia in economics and the fine arts. She worked in the media and advertising industry in Pakistan for a few years before returning to the US to pursue her master’s degree in journalism from New York University. This documentary is her thesis project. She currently lives in London as a freelance journalist and writes for womensnews.org.

Cinematography: Italo Vazzana
Editing: Tehmina Ahmed
Script: Tehmina Ahmed
Produced and
Directed by: Tehmina Ahmed

SYNOPSIS
A sitar nawaz, who hails from the gharana of musicians in Delhi, finds his home atmosphere not conducive to the practice of his art.
He moves from Karachi to New York and finds much encouragement there.

THE FILMMAKER
Tehmina Ahmed is a writer, editor, photographer and film producer. She is one of the founding editors of Newsline and a faculty member at the Indus Valley School of Art and Architecture. She has produced a number of documentaries for Newsline’s video production unit, Newsline Films.

SYNOPSIS
“India Untouched: Stories of a People Apart” is perhaps the most comprehensive look at the untouchable caste ever undertaken on film. Director Stalin K. spent four years travelling the length and breadth of the country to expose the continued suppression of the Dalits, the ‘broken people’ who suffer under a 4000 year-old religious system. The film exposes the continuation of caste practices and discrimination in Sikhism, Christianity and Islam, and even amongst the communists of Kerala.

THE FILMMAKER
Stalin K. is a human rights activist and an award-winning documentary filmmaker. In recent years he has become known for his pioneering ‘participatory media’ work with urban and rural communities, in which local people produce their own videos and radio programmes as an empowerment tool. He is a renowned public speaker and has lectured at over 20 institutions in both India and the US.

“India Untouched” is Stalin’s second film on the issue of caste. His earlier film, “Lesser Humans”, which is about manual scavenging, won the Silver Conch at the Mumbai International Film Festival and the Excellence Award at Earth Vision Film Festival, Tokyo, and helped to bring international attention to the issue of caste.

Cinematography: Richard Malone
Producer: Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy
Directed by: Ed Robins and Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy

SYNOPSIS
In the past five years more than four million Iraqis - 20 per cent of the entire population- have been driven from their homes as a result of the war and sectarian bloodshed. Two million have become exiles, living desperate lives across the border in Syria and Jordan. Filmmaker Sharmeen Obaid-Chincy investigates the biggest and most catastrophic refugee crisis in the Middle East since the Palestinian diaspora of 1948.

THE FILMMAKER
Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy is the first non-American to be awarded the prestigious Livingston Award for international reporting. She is also the youngest recipient of the One World Media broadcast journalist of the year award in the UK. In the last 7 years, she has produced and directed 13 documentaries for major networks including CNN, PBS, Channel 4, and the Discovery Channel.

Ed Robbins is an award winning producer, director, and writer of numerous one hour documentaries for BBC 2, Bravo, National Geographic, Discovery, PBS and the New York Times, amongst many others.

Cinematography: Ranjan Palit
Editing: Tarun Bhartiya
Sound: Madhu Apsara
Music: Suchet Malhotra
Script: Sanjay Kak, Tarun Bhartiya
Produced and Directed by: Sanjay Kak

SYNOPSIS
It’s 15th August, when India celebrates its independence from the British, and the Indian flag ritually goes up in the heart of Srinagar, Kashmir. But the empty streets and the sullen silence that greet India’s claim on Kashmir spark off old questions about freedom and its denial. In the aftermath of 18 years of armed struggle, with 60,000 dead and nearly 7,000 missing, violence and death are everywhere.

THE FILMMAKER
Born in 1958, Sanjay Kak is an independent documentary filmmaker whose recent work reflects his interest in ecology, alternatives and resistance politics. His film “Words on Water” (2003) won Best Long Film Prize at the International Festival of Environmental Film & Video, Brazil, amongst other prizes. “In the Forest Hangs a Bridge” (1999) received the Golden Lotus for Best Documentary Film at the 1999 National Film Awards in India and the Asian Gaze Award at the Pusan Short Film Festival, Korea. As Producer and Director he has also made films on the theme of migration, including “This Land, My Land, Eng-Land!” (1993) and “A House and a Home” (1993). Kak studied economics and sociology at Delhi University.

Cinematography: Abdul Adnan
Editing: M. Minhaj khan
Voice: Khalid Moin
Produced and Directed by: Muhammad Imran

SYNOPSIS
This documentary presents the squalor and the subhuman conditions which the squatters and slum dwellers of Karachi live in. They carve out a very basic existence under severe conditions and are under a constant fear eviction.

THE FILMMAKER
Although Muhammad Imran graduated in applied economics, his innate passion and flair for art and literature brought him into the world of media. He began his career at Aaj TV in 2005, and is currently a producer at TV One and News One.

Cinematography: Anssi Leino
Editing: Annukka Lilja
Script: Iris Olsson
Producer: Kai Kuikkaniemi
Directed by: Iris Olsson

SYNOPSIS
Svetlana, an eleven-year-old girl from a children’s home in Russia, is the ‘sponsored child’ of a couple from Finland. Living only 60km from the Finnish border, Svetlana has never visited her neighbouring country. After a long wait, Svetlana finally gets an invitation to have a look at life on the other side of the border.

THE FILMMAKER
Iris Olsson was born in 1981 and is studying documentary film at the School of Motion Picture, Television, and Production Design at the University of Art and Design, Helsinki. She has worked as a freelancer in the field of television and film production and has taught filmmaking to children in Senegal. Her previous films are a short film “Saly” (2005), and a documentary, “Flight”, in 2004.

Cinematography: Mourad Boucif
Editing: Denise Vindevogel
Script: Mourad Boucif
Producer: Vanessa Brichaut
Directed by: Mourad Boucif

SYNOPSIS
“The Colour of Sacrifice” is about men who came from the colonised countries and were forced to enlist and play a crucial role during the Second World War. Ignored by the textbooks and excluded from the big commemoration shows, they now attempt to make this overshadowed page of history exist, and to testify about the way the French government has ignored them. Forced to live far from their families, often in unsanitary conditions, many of them are reduced to begging in the streets of the Republic. In spite of the contempt and striking injustices, these men offer us a beautiful lesson in humanity.

THE FILMMAKER
Mourad Boucif is a Belgian filmmaker of Moroccan parentage, born in 1967 in Algeria. In 1996, he launched a filmmaking project with underprivileged youth in the Molenbeek-Saint-Jean district. He has made two feature films as writer/director: “Beyond Gibraltar” (2001) and “Silver Tears” (2007).

Editing: Mohammed Zubair Mallick , Muddabir Majid
Script: Umer Aziz Khan
Producers: NCA Productions, LazyBones Productions
Directed by: Mohammed Zubair Mallick and Umer Aziz Khan

SYNOPSIS
Auto rickshaws are the preferred means of public transportation in Lahore. These three wheelers are an indispensable part of the city’s culture and have a peculiar shape and canopy that has been a part of their generic image for many years. Witty limericks, poetry and slogans have been painted on some of these rickshaws. This documentary is divided into sections that observe the various adornments: religious and mystic poetry, Pashto, advertisement slogans, and love poetry. The drivers are seen as a lively lot, despite having to face a government ban forcing them to shift to a 4-stroke engine which, although available on easy loans, are faulty and break down easily.

THE FILMMAKERS
Mohammed Zubair Mallick is a director and a recently qualified ACCA. He has been greatly inspired by the works of David Lynch, Martin Scorsese and Bret Ratner. He is the founder of LazyBones Productions, which is associated with NCA Productions. “Living Literature” is his directorial debut.

Umar Aziz Khan is a director and a journalist working for The Nation. A graduate in economics, he seems to have a bit of a fixation with rickshaws. It was from a previous experience of working closely with rickshaw drivers that Khan saw their vibrancy and zest for life, despite their rather bleak financial situation.

Cinematography: Nelson Walker III, Bent-Jorgeu Perlmutt
Editing: Lynn True
Produced and Directed by: Bent-Jorgeu Perlmutt and Nelson Walker III

SYNOPSIS
Recently engaged to a young man from her village, twenty-year-old Lumo Sinai can’t wait to start a family. But when she crosses paths with marauding soldiers who brutally attack her, she is left with a fistula – a condition that leaves her incontinent and threatens her ability to give birth. Rejected by her fiancé and cast aside by her family, Lumo finds her way to the one place that may save her: a hospital for rape survivors. On this uncertain road to recovery, Lumo proves that the solidarity of women can heal even the deepest wounds.

THE FILMMAKERS
Bent-Jorgen Perlmutt holds a B.A. from Brown University and an M.F.A. from Columbia University. He served as co-producer and additional editor of “Control Room” in 2004. Perlmutt currently works as a correspondent at UNICEF, for which he recently produced four short films on child soldiers in the Congo. His latest fiction film, “Les Vulnerables”, was recently selected as the closing night short of the 2007 New York Film Festival.

Nelson Walker III began his career writing documentaries for the Discovery Channel, the History Channel and the PBS series “NOVA.” His directorial debut, “iThemba Hope”, aired on the Sundance Channel in 2005. Walker works regularly as a cinematographer for the renowned documentary film company Maysles Films.