Category: Blog

We are honored to receive the Jury Award from Pebbles Underground!

Lauren and I had such a fun and memorable experience at Mountainfilm festival! It was so great to connect and bond with other artists and filmmakers. I was also so happy to reconnect with my former students who are part of the Mountainfilm Festival crew.

Also a shoutout to Firelight Media, our amazing production studio behind our film Trip Ziggurat.

“Through the Student Lens” festival presents assorted work, boosts film accessibility

“It’s just nice for us to get together in a dark theater and share a world,” Alshaibi said during the Friday showing. “I really believe that filmmaking is a way to enter another person’s life, to enter someone’s dreams and their desires and their fears, and to share that experience helps us to understand one another a little better. I think it makes a better world when we can all share our stories.” (read more)

The premiere screening of my feature film This Has Already Happened at East Window gallery was deeply touching and meaningful. My child, Muneera, who also stars in the film, was there, along with my creative partner and wife, Lauren. Many of my former and current students came as well, which made the evening feel especially personal.

It was an intimate gathering,  and I was grateful for the thoughtful questions and the warmth everyone brought into the conversation.

More pictures from the event: click here.

The Night Award honors films, which are able to balance ambiguity and complexity characterized by enigmatic mysteriousness and subtleness, which keeps mind and consideration moving.

Jury Declaration Statement:
If machines could dream, what would they dream of? Of being able to dance. An intriguing use of double exposure and a structure that is both simple and precise. The film evokes artificial intelligence becoming organic. For its poetic vision the jury awards Testimony a Special Mention, Night Award. 

Photo of Usama by Robert Ortega for an upcoming short documentary.