Shakti Bhagchandani

Distinguished Teacher 2022–23

Shakti Bhagchandani is a filmmaker from the UAE. She completed her MFA in Screenwriting and Directing at Columbia University, where she began her career with a narrative short film, Lostfound, which played Sundance Film Festival, BAM, Chicago International Film Festival, and New Orleans Film Festival, amongst others. Her second short, an experimental film called How to Make a Bomb in the Kitchen of Your Mom, played at Hamptons International Film Festival and BFI London Film Festival. She has written four additional short films: Khargosh, a film that was showcased at Palm Springs International Shortfest; Absent, a Vimeo Staff Pick that played at Hamptons Film Festival and New Orleans Film Festival; British by the Grace of God, which premiered at Locarno Film Festival, Valladolid Film Festival, and Zagreb Film Festival; and Kingdom Come, which played at Venice International Film Festival, Stockholm Film Festival (where it won the International Jury Award), and was nominated for a London Critics’ Circle Award. She is an alum of the Sundance Screenwriters Intensive Lab and a recipient of a Hollywood Foreign Press Association Fellowship. Outside of her professional practice, she has also served on the jury of several women-focused international film festivals, including Women’s Voices Now, a United Nations consultative non-profit.