(dir. Mira Nair, US/India/Qatar, 2013, 128 m)
Starring Kate Hudson, Kiefer Sutherland, Liev Schreiber, Riz Ahmed
Q&A with Director Mira Nair and Producer Lydia Dean Pilcher, moderated by best-selling author and film critic Thelma Adams.
ABOUT THE FILM: We begin in 2011 in Lahore. At an outdoor café a Pakistani man named Changez (Riz Ahmed) tells Bobby (Liev Schreiber), an American journalist, about his experiences in the United States. Roll back ten years, and we find a younger Changez fresh from Princeton, seeking fortune and glory on Wall Street. The American Dream seems well within his grasp, complete with a smart and gorgeous artist girlfriend, Erica (Kate Hudson). But when the Twin Towers are attacked, a cultural divide slowly begins to crack open between Changez and Erica. Changez’s dream soon begins to slip into nightmare: profiled, wrongfully arrested, strip-searched and interrogated, he is transformed from a well-educated, upwardly mobile businessman to a scapegoat and perceived enemy. With time, he begins to hear the call of his own homeland. Taking us through the culturally rich and beguiling worlds of New York, Lahore and Istanbul, The Reluctant Fundamentalist is a story about conflicting ideologies where perception and suspicion have the power to determine life or death.
Academy-Award nominated film director Mira Nair is best known for her groundbreaking films that cross borders of all kinds: Salaam Bombay! (Caméra D’or, Cannes 1988), the pioneering Asian-African romance Mississippi Masala (1991), Golden Globe & Emmy-winning Hysterical Blindness (2001), and the international hit Monsoon Wedding (2001), for which she was the first woman to win Venice Film Festival’s prestigious Golden Lion. Also known for her literary craftsmanship of subcontinental fiction, Mira has filmed The Namesake (2006), The Reluctant Fundamentalist (2012), Vanity Fair (2004), A Suitable Boy (2020) and Queen of Katwe (2016). Her most recent endeavor was directing Monsoon Wedding the Musical, which opened in New York City in May 2023 and is bound for Broadway. Nair’s next film will be AMRI, an experimental portrait of Amrita Sher-Gil.
An activist by nature, Nair founded Salaam Baalak Trust for Indian street children in 1988 and the Maisha Film Lab in 2004, a free school to train filmmakers in Africa. In 2012, she was awarded the Padma Bhushan, India’s third-highest civilian honour.
Independent producer and leader of PGA-WGA Climate Storytelling Initiative, Lydia Dean Pilcher has produced over 35 feature films, including Queen of Katwe, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, Radium Girls, and Cutie & The Boxer, which was nominated for an Academy Award. She has just completed a climate change-themed film called HOMING INSTINCT.
“After Monsoon Wedding and The Namesake, The Reluctant Fundamentalist is [Mira] Nair’s most engaging work.”
“Nair lets her drama unfold thoughtfully and draws impressive supporting performances from Kiefer Sutherland, as Changez’s Wall Street boss, and Liev Schreiber.”