BABAK PAYAMI

Babak Payami is an Iranian-Canadian writer, director, and producer whose work moves between political cinema, character-driven drama, and documentary inquiry.

He received the Silver Lion for Best Director at the Venice International Film Festival for Secret Ballot. His films include One More Day, The Silence Between Two Thoughts, Iqbal: The Story of a Fearless Child, Manhattan Undying, and 752 Is Not a Number.

Payami directs stories shaped by moral pressure, political consequence, and human contradiction. His work has been produced and exhibited internationally across Europe, North America, and the Middle East. He is available for select feature-film, limited-series, documentary, and international co-production assignments.

Payami studied Cinema Studies at the University of Toronto before leaving to pursue filmmaking. In the late 1990s, he wrote, produced, and directed his first feature, One More Day, which premiered in the Panorama programme of the Berlin International Film Festival and received the Best Artistic Contribution Award at the Tokyo International Film Festival.

His second feature, Secret Ballot, was produced with Marco Müller and Fabrica, the Benetton communications research centre in Italy. The film premiered in competition at the 2001 Venice International Film Festival, where Payami received the Silver Lion for Best Director. The film established him as a distinctive voice in contemporary international cinema: formally controlled, politically alert, and attentive to the lives caught inside systems of power.

In 2002, Payami began production on The Silence Between Two Thoughts in remote eastern Iran, near the borders of Afghanistan and Pakistan. During post-production, Iranian authorities arrested Payami and confiscated the film’s original negative and sound materials. Forced into exile, he reconstructed the film from salvaged rushes. It was subsequently presented at the Venice International Film Festival.

Following his exile, Payami continued to work across Europe and North America. He taught directing at Filmakademie Baden-Württemberg in Germany and led filmmaking workshops in Italy and Canada. He later served as Creative Director of Fabrica’s Media Studio in Italy, where he mentored emerging artists and developed documentary and audiovisual projects.

From 2011 to 2020, Payami served as Artistic Director of Tirgan, the Toronto-based Iranian arts and culture festival. During that period, he helped shape its artistic direction, public profile, and international programming.

In 2015, Payami co-wrote and co-directed the animated feature Iqbal: The Story of a Fearless Child, a film addressing child labour through the perspective of a young protagonist.

He directed and co-produced Manhattan Undying, an English-language romantic drama starring Luke Grimes and Sarah Roemer. The film was released internationally by Paramount Pictures and eOne.

After the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps shot down Ukraine International Airlines Flight PS752 in January 2020, Payami worked closely with affected families and directed 752 Is Not a Number, a documentary centred on grief, accountability, and the pursuit of justice. The film premiered at the 2022 Toronto International Film Festival and was named second runner-up for the festival’s People’s Choice Award for Documentaries.

Across narrative and documentary work, Payami’s films examine private lives under public pressure: power and impunity, displacement and belonging, memory and loss, and the cost of pursuing truth when institutions fail.