Description:

In a country offering almost no treatment services despite a crisis of addiction, Laila Haidari took the highly unusual decision to found her own pioneering addiction treatment center and a restaurant where all of the waiters are recovering heroin addicts. A deeply personal perspective on the global addiction epidemic, the film follows the labor of love of one woman fighting to keep her center alive in the face of physical threats, governmental opposition, and the departure of the international community from Afghanistan.

Biography:

Elizabeth Mirzaei moved to Kabul in 2007 as a volunteer photography instructor at the AINA Photojournalism Institute. She co-directed films for Al Jazeera English, their latest being For Sardar: The Afghan Journalist. Elizabeth was a director and cinematographer on the BBC’s The Killing of Farkhunda, which was nominated for a Royal TV Society Award, and a cinematographer on the Emmy-nominated documentary, What Tomorrow Brings. Her short films have also been shown before world leaders and key policy makers at the Oslo Conference on Women’s Rights, the International Conference on Afghanistan in London, and before an audience of 60,000 at the Global Citizen Festival in Central Park, New York.

Gulistan Mirzaei was mentored by award-winning Afghan director Siddiq Barmak (Osama) and was a line producer for Voice of America. He has co-directed documentaries for Al Jazeera’s Witness program and worked with the Tiziano Project to teach filmmaking to students in a Kabul high school. Gulistan was awarded the IDFA Bertha Fund and the Gucci-Tribeca Documentary Fund for the film Laila at the Bridge.

Ina Fichman isveteran producer/executive producer at the helms of Intuitive Pictures. They recently produced the acclaimed features Mabul (The Flood), Monsoon, The Wanted 18 and Vita Activa: The Spirit of Hannah Arendt. Intuitive recently completed the documentary Game Fever, The Patriot, Shekinah 2, Gift, Laila at the Bridge, and The Oslo Diaries.