by Jasmine Davis
Female empowerment begins in many places. For some, it starts at a young age, for others, it comes about as part of a career. Some people simply exude female empowerment - Lena Khan is one of them. This Muslim woman filmmaker graduated with degrees in political science and history from UCLA and eventually went to and graduated from the UCLA School of Theater, Film and Television. While most of her body of work is music videos and commercials, she’s currently fundraising to create a feature film, The Tiger Hunter.
“All work, and especially art, is in a constant state of improvement. Each director's films get better with time. I hope I can reach a place in my career where I can focus far more on the artistic side than the promotion, fundraising, and the like. So far, with everyone's support, I think that may be possible,” said Khan in a recent interview.
As Khan points out, promoting and fundraising are critical parts of making a film that often take up much of an independent filmmaker’s time. That’s what’s so great about platforms like Film Annex - you can both promote your film and earn money for it. Women from Afghanistan and other countries around the world, including the United States, are empowered to earn money for their films online.
Khan says that fundraising has always been part of her path. In fact, it’s taken her to some interesting places in her career:
“Since I sometimes wasn't able to network as easily as I might have liked, I needed to offer something outside of volunteering on film sets or buying them a beer. This meant I needed to be able to make my own projects. As any film student will tell you, that's not easy. I saved up money and wrote scripts so I could make my own short films, and that led to contracted work doing music videos or commercials. In this way, I could hire others and work with them. That was the best way to network.”
As the article points out, Khan was not able to network “informally” as easy as others. She says that she’s had to work hard to get the same amount of recognition as others. However, she says, “As for being a Muslim woman, yes, there are prejudice and barriers to entry into the film industry for both Muslims and women. But, you won't get anywhere in life if you try to gain recognition based on the label you carry rather than the quality of your work. That's the end goal for me.”
Women from Afghanistan and other countries could learn a lot from women like Lena Khan. Film education helps to empower women in Afghanistan and around the globe to tell their unique stories. Education for women in Afghanistan, through initiatives like the Afghan Development Project, may help them become leading women filmmakers. Working hard and finding ways to create interesting stories via film could lead to promising careers.
