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Movie director Mira Nair discusses her film The Reluctant Fundamentalist 2012. Its based on a novel and filmed in her native Pakistan, she describes the experience as 'dazzling' and her intention was to show modern Pakistan post 9/11, few films have concentrated on this, instead mainly focus on the partition issue. Riz Ahmed stars as a man torn between the two countries, his homeland and the West. Nair talks about her career and starting out as a documentary filmmaker, her first film about the street children of Bombay titled Salaam Bombay!. Its a heartening film where she spent all day shooting with professional actors and non professional actors and then by night calling financiers on the phone to keep the film rolling. It premiered at the Cannes Film Festival and won the Camera d'Or and was also nominated for an Oscar for Best International film. It so successful that Nair used the profit from the film to set up a trust for street children in India, where they are looked after by a shelter, its the 'gift that keeps on giving, art can change the world'. Mississippi Masala 1991 is about an Indian family being ousted from their home in Uganda by dictator Idi Armin, they relocate to Mississippi where the daughter falls in love with Denzel Washington's character, the film is about love and racial divide. Nair talks about falling in love with Uganda whilst filming there. Monsoon Wedding 2001 An experimental film featuring a lot of her family as actors, she wanted to make a beautiful, colourful and energetic, set at traditional Indian wedding. It was so successful that she was asked to adapt it to a musical for Broadway. Nair considers herself to be 'Bollywood in spirit but not in style'. Vanity Fair 2004 a period film, based on the book by William Thackeray who was born in Calcutta, she loved the outsider element she was instantly drawn to the story. London at that time was full of social climbers, decadence and money. Nair loved working with American Reece Witherspoon, who she describes as 'an A-list Hollywood star and extraordinarily talented.' The Namesake 2006 based on the book about an Indian family re-locating to America and trying to settle. Nair at the time had just suffered a huge personal loss and felt a real connection to the book, so she decided to make the film, it was born out of loss and grief. 'The film starred Irrfan Khan who Nair had to un-cast in a previous film because of his height, she always felt like she owed him after that so she had to cast him as Ashoke, he was perfect. Amelia 2009 starring Hilary Swank as Amelia Earhart the first woman to fly over the Atlantic Ocean. The story was extraordinary, it started off being an indie film but got picked up by a studio. Unfortunately though, it wasn't her most successful film. Nair discusses what she is planning next, when she is not busy with her family and her love of growing tress, she plans to make a film tying in the two countries she loves the most, India and Uganda.

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