Afia Nathaniel Pakistan / US 2003 Grantee US - Canada Program MFA in Film Directing from Columbia University BSc in Computer Science from Lahore University of Management Sciences
Pakistani-American filmmaker, Afia, loves pushing the boundaries of narrative storytelling. Her debut feature film Dukhtar (Daughter) premiered at Toronto (2014) becoming Pakistan’s Official Submission for Foreign Language Film at the 87th Academy Awards®. The film played to critical acclaim in over 20 countries to rave reviews and became the Critics’ Pick (Village Voice) and the People Magazine’s Pick of the Week. The film has won several awards, including the Adrienne Shelly award for Directors, Audience Award for Best Feature at Creteil, Best World Feature at Sonoma, and Best Director and Best Feature Film at South Asia International Film Festival.
Through her films, Afia explores pressing social justice issues of our time, often difficult ones, like child marriage, forced marriage, fundamentalism in the context of patriarchal cultures and how it affects identity of the self and humanity. A notable LA Times film critic lauds Afia’s work as “a stunning, emotive work that takes to task oppressive patriarchy” another one commenting on her style as “haunting…like a fairytale”.
Afia graduated from Columbia University with an MFA in Film Directing (Dean’s Fellow). She is an alumnus of Independent Filmmaker Project, Tribeca Film Institute, Film Independent and Berlin Talent Project Market.
Afia shares her love for telling stories with her students. She teaches directing and screenwriting at Temple University. She has also taught at Princeton University (Peter B. Lewis Fellow), Columbia University’s Graduate Film Division and NYU’s Tisch. She is a generous mentor to other filmmakers through IFP’s Narrative Labs.
Afia says “The MMEG grant came at a very critical stage in my graduate studies to support my work as a filmmaker who wanted to tell stories about brown women and girls.”
