Sushmit Ghosh: Last News

When the Oscar nominations for Best Documentary Feature were announced last year, a big underdog made the cut: Writing with Fire.

Leo Barraclough International Features Editor Iran’s Asghar Farhadi, who directed the Oscar winners “A Separation” and “The Salesman,” U.S. producer Christine Vachon, whose credits includes Oscar winner “Boys Don’t Cry,” and Oscar nominees “Far from Heaven” and “Carol,” and Romania’s Alexander Nanau, the director of the Oscar nominated “Collective,” are among the jury members at the 18th edition of the Zurich Film Festival, which takes place from Sept. 22 to Oct. 2.  Farhadi will head the jury for the International Feature Film Competition. He is joined by the U.K.’s Clio Barnard, who directed the BAFTA nominated “The Arbor,” “The Selfish Giant” and “Ali & Ava”; L.A.-based Brazilian Daniel Dreifuss, a producer on the Oscar nominated “No” and “All Quiet on the Western Front,” Germany’s Oscar entry; Swiss/Italian screenwriter and director Petra Volpe, whose credits include Tribeca prizewinner “The Divine Order”; and  Sweden’s Peter “Piodor” Gustafsson, the producer of Ali Abbassi’s “Border,” which won the main award in the Un Certain Regard section at Cannes.

Writing With Fire’s Oscar nomination for Best Documentary Feature wasn’t just a huge achievement for directors Sushmit Ghosh and Rintu Thomas. It was a triumph for all of India.

Selome Hailu editorCAA has signed documentary filmmakers Rintu Thomas and Sushmit Ghosh, directors of “Writing With Fire,” which won an audience award and special jury award at the 2021 Sundance Film Festival, and was just nominated for best feature honors by the International Documentary Assn.CAA will also represent Black Ticket Films, the social justice-focused production company Thomas and Ghosh founded in 2009.“Writing With Fire,” Thomas and Ghosh’s feature debut, tells the story of Khabar Lahariya, a female-run newspaper in northern India whose journalists are all Dalit, the lowest group in the Hindu caste system.