It's been a long road getting Shamak ready for launch, but we're very close and I'm excited to share the video campaign that will go along with it :) Also, I'll be announcing the working title of my thesis film soon....stay tuned Sadly some links such as RTP's first review have expired. However the editor at the Desert Sun was generous to dig out the article for me. So here it is!
ShortFest Reviews: 'Road to Peshawar'
By Bruce Fessier - The Desert Sun
Director: Hammad Rizvi
Cast: Yasmine Al-Bustami, Philip Kreyche, Mustafa Faiz, Isabela Costine
Story line: An Afghan father takes his blinded daughter across the dangerous Peshawar Pass during the Afghan-Soviet war to receive better medical aid than they can get on the Afghan side of the border. When the dad steps on a land mine, a Russian soldier feels compelled to respond to the little girl's cries for help.
Score card: 9 (out of 10). Rizvi has written and directed a remarkable image-driven student film. The story depicts the humanity of individuals on both sides of the war and the sad reality of the old saw, "No good deed goes unpunished." Faiz tugs at the heart strings with his performance as a father trying to respond to his frightened daughter as his lays dying, and Kreyche takes the drama to another level when he shows a soldier's conflict between helping the little girl and complying with his commanding officer's order to leave her stranded amid the field of land mines. The ending is surprising, perhaps unlikely, but satisfying.