{"id":71627,"date":"2016-02-29T03:03:05","date_gmt":"2016-02-29T08:03:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/?p=71627"},"modified":"2016-02-29T03:03:05","modified_gmt":"2016-02-29T08:03:05","slug":"pakistani-canadian-sharmeen-obaid-chinoy-wins-documentary-short-oscar","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/2016\/02\/29\/pakistani-canadian-sharmeen-obaid-chinoy-wins-documentary-short-oscar\/","title":{"rendered":"Pakistani Canadian Sharmeen Obaid Chinoy wins documentary short Oscar"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Pakistani-Canadian<\/a>
Pakistani-Canadian filmmaker Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy, director of A Girl in the River: The Price of Forgiveness, accepts award for the best short documentary at the 88th Annual Academy Awards. (Photo courtesy of The Oscar<\/a>)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

LOS ANGELES\u2014A searing look at honour killings in Pakistan earned Pakistani-Canadian filmmaker Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy an Academy Award on Sunday night.<\/p>\n

The 37-year-old director claimed her second career Oscar, this time winning for \u201cA Girl in the River: The Price of Forgiveness\u201d in the best short documentary category.<\/p>\n

The film examines the case of an 18-year-old Pakistani girl who survived a brutal attack by her father and uncle bent on an \u201chonour killing.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is what happens when determined women get together,\u201d a triumphant Obaid-Chinoy declared to cheers from the celeb-studded crowd.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis week the Pakistani prime minister has said that he will change the law on honour killing after watching this film. That is the power of film.\u201d<\/p>\n

It was the sole Canadian win among a broad swath of homegrown nominees, including not one but two contenders in the best picture race: the Canada-Ireland co-production \u201cRoom\u201d and the Canada-U.K.-Ireland co-production \u201cBrooklyn.\u201d<\/p>\n

Those films lost to \u201cSpotlight,\u201d a muck-raking drama about sex abuse in the Catholic Church which emerged victorious over leading nominee \u201cThe Revenant.\u201d<\/p>\n

The movie was largely shot in Toronto and Hamilton with Canadian actors including Rachel McAdams, who was nominated but lost for her supporting role as a Boston Globe reporter, and Len Cariou as a cardinal. Producers included Toronto-bred Michael Bederman.<\/p>\n

Other Canadian hopefuls who went home empty-handed included writer Emma Donoghue who was nominated for best adapted screenplay for \u201cRoom,\u201d and chart-topper the Weeknd, who was up for best song for \u201cEarned It\u201d from \u201cFifty Shades of Grey.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cRoom\u201d did earn a statue by way of best actress winner Brie Larson, a U.S. starlet on the rise for her turn as a resilient mother determined to give her son a happy childhood after years living in captivity.<\/p>\n

Obaid-Chinoy adds Sunday’s trophy to one she claimed in 2012 for the documentary short \u201cSaving Face,\u201d about acid attacks.<\/p>\n

\u201cA Girl in the River\u201d is the latest in a series of socially charged investigative films from her Karachi-based film company SOC Film.<\/p>\n

Rights groups estimate that about 1,000 Pakistani women are killed every year for \u201cbringing shame\u201d to their families.<\/p>\n

The brutal tradition allows murderers to avoid punishment if they are forgiven by the family of their victims.<\/p>\n

The Pakistani premiere was attended by senior cabinet members and diplomats. After the screening, Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif vowed to change laws that allow families to murder their daughters in the name of \u201chonour.\u201d<\/p>\n

Obaid-Chinoy’s other accolades include a Queen Elizabeth II Diamond Jubilee Medal, a Crystal Award from the World Economic Forum and a state honour from the Pakistani government.<\/p>\n

In the weeks leading up to the Oscars, Obaid-Chinoy said she was grateful to see her nomination spark discussion around religiously motivated murders.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think that that’s a win in itself because it’s such a difficult topic and people shy away from it, normally,\u201d said Obaid-Chinoy, a dual citizen who lived in Toronto from 2004 to 2015.<\/p>\n

Her competition Sunday included Toronto-based journalist Adam Benzine, who was up for his short film \u201cClaude Lanzmann: Spectres of the Shoah.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cA Girl in the River: The Price of Forgiveness\u201d is set to air on HBO Canada on March 7.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

LOS ANGELES\u2014A searing look at honour killings in Pakistan earned Pakistani-Canadian filmmaker Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy an Academy Award on Sunday night. …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":33,"featured_media":71628,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,106],"tags":[35],"class_list":["post-71627","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-entertainment","category-hollywood","tag-original","mauthors-the-canadian-press"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/71627","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/33"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=71627"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/71627\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/71628"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=71627"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=71627"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=71627"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}