Mightier Then The Sword, which is produced by Journeys to the Edge, has won Best Foreign Documentary at the Artemis Women in Action Film Festival in Santa Monica, Calif. The festival and awards ceremony takes place April 26-29.
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Young Kabul fashion maven helps modernize Afghanistan
Rahiba Rahimi reinvents traditional clothing for the modern Afghan woman Rahiba Rahimi is a political science student at the American University of Afghanistan in Kabul. As part of the generation of Afghans that is embracing liberal ideas, gender equality and human rights, Rahiba is one of many young people who is working hard to modernize…
Recording a live terrorist attack in Afghan parliament
I sensed, just to my left, cameraman Nima Latifi trying to get my attention. At the time, we were deep into an interview with Masood Sanjar, the director of broadcast and acquisitions for Afghanistan’s MOBY Group, which owns Tolo TV, Afghanistan’s first commercial and most popular television channel. I turned towards Nima, who pointed, alarmed,…
The role of ‘fixers’ in getting the story amidst Taliban threat
Filming Mightier Than The Sword in Afghanistan was, at times, risky. A Westerner like myself needs a “fixer” to ensure safety and help get the job done. I had one of the best: Shuja Momuzai, who was also my fixer when Tallulah and I were there in 2012 writing and photographing stories for magazines. A…
Feminist men are helping change Afghanistan
The dominance of the patriarchy in all aspects of Afghan society — and women’s attempt to change it — is the driving force behind the creation of the documentary Mightier Than The Sword. It is important to point out, however, that enlightened men are working in concert with women to help make their country more…
The dangers of reporting the news in Afghanistan
This is a terrific short documentary on the extreme dangers journalists face reporting in Afghanistan. It features award-winning journalist Shakila ibrahimkhail, one of the main characters in my own documentary Mightier Than The Sword. Me and my Afghan film crew saw firsthand the extreme security measures that the TOLO TV facility undertook to keep staff…
The power of the media for Afghan women
Roberta Staley and the rest of the crew from Mightier Than The Sword want to say a huge thank you to all the wonderful contributors from around the world: Denmark, the US and UK, Norway, the Czech Republic and, of course, Canada who have helped with the initial push of our Indiegogo campaign. We’re humbled…
“Afghan Women: What the West Gets Wrong”
There was a terrific article by novelist Bina Shah in the April 28 New York Times opinion pages titled “Afghan Women: What the West Gets Wrong” describing the complexity of gender rights in Afghanistan. Far from being “silent and passive victims of their culture, their men and their politics,” Shah wrote, quoting Spogmai Akseer of…
“I had no idea” is the common reaction to Afghan women in media
There was an interesting comment on Facebook in a thread about my documentary. A gentleman named Keith MacIntyre wrote: “Thanks for sharing that, I had no idea the positive impact the conflict had. Unfortunately the media is more interested in number of bombs dropped, number of soldiers killed, and the politics of going to or…
Mightier Than The Sword producer/director to be interviewed by Story Board
Rachel Sanders of Story Board contacted me yesterday, on the first day of the Indiegogo campaign, to request an interview to discuss the making of the documentary Mightier Than The Sword. Story Board, which was founded by the Canadian Media Guild and the Canadian Writers Group, is an online community for independent journalists and freelance…