The Current

Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy fights to end honour killings with her film A Girl in the River

Oscar award-winning Canadian journalist and filmmaker Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy has turned her lens on honour killings in Pakistan for her latest film, A Girl in the River: The Price of Forgiveness.
Oscar winning filmmaker Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy arrives at her office in Karachi, Pakistan on Feb. 2, 2016. Obaid-Chinoy is nominated for a second Oscar for A Girl in the River, her moving story of a teenage girl shot and dumped into a river because she married a man of her choosing. (Shakil Adil/AP)

Read story transcript

Left for dead by her own uncle, and father, Saba Qaiser was the intended victim of a so-called honour killing. But she survived to tell her tale.

Honour killings remain a shockingly common occurrence in Pakistan today. And Oscar award-winning Canadian journalist and filmmaker Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy has turned her lens on the phenomenon for her latest film, A Girl in the River: The Price of Forgiveness, which tells Saba Qaiser's story.

It's been nominated for best Documentary Short at this year's Academy Awards. It won't be the first time Obaid-Chinoy will walk the red carpet. In 2012, her film Saving Face won in the Short Documentary category.

Speaking to Obaid-Chinoy about Saba and that pressure she was under to forgive stirred some complicated feelings in our gest host Amanda Lindhout. You can listen to her essay about forgiveness on the audio link here.