Sitara: Let Girls Dream is an animated short film that follows the story of Pari, a 14-year-old girl with dreams of becoming a pilot, while growing up in a society that doesn’t allow her to dream.

Director: Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy is a two-time Academy Award-winner and three-time Emmy Award-winner. She is known for her work in films that highlight the inequality of women. Sharmeen is the only female director to have won two Academy Awards by the age of 37 and her work has been screened around the world. Saving Face (HBO), which chronicles the lives of survivors of acid violence, won the 2012 Oscar for Best Documentary Short and was also Pakistan’s first Academy Award. A Girl in the River: The Price for Forgiveness (HBO) followed the honor killings in Pakistan won the 2015 Oscar for Best Documentary Short. Additional projects include: Song of Lahore, Saving Face, Peace Keepers and Transgenders: Pakistan’s Open Secret.

Composer: Four-time Emmy Award and Grammy Award Winner Laura Karpman
Auspices: VICE Studios financed and produced the film. Imke Fehrmann serves as producer on the film. Women's rights activist Gloria Steinem and Darla Anderson, the Academy Award-winning producer of Coco and Toy Story 3, VICE Media Group CEO Nancy Dubuc, and Emmy-nominated Ariel Wengroff serve as executive producers, as well as Sharmeen’s animation production company Waadi Animation. Adnan Saeed joins the crew as CG supervisor, while Salman Nasir is the Art Director and Kamran Khan as the animation director.

Quote from Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy: “Young girls everywhere still face considerable hurdles in achieving their dreams. SITARA embodies that struggle; it is the story of Pari, a young girl who dreams of becoming a pilot and is robbed of it. For me, SITARA is more than a film, it is a movement that we want to start across the world, that encourages parents to invest in their girls’ dreams, freeing their daughters from the burdens of early marriage.”

Quote from Gloria Steinem: “Thanks to the universal language of animation, Sitara will help girls everywhere to dream and to soar.”

Quote from Ariel Wengroff: “12 million girls every year are forced into child marriage, losing their ability to dream. We hope this film gives young people and their family the ability to spark a conversation for a different perspective on what we allow our children to aspire to be when they grow up. We are thrilled to have Netflix as a partner to share this project with the world.”

GUCCI’s social impact initiative Chime for Change, Sharmeen Obaid Chinoy, and Ariel Wengroff will create an impact campaign for the film around the theme “Let Girls Dream,” through which they hope to encourage girls around the world to share their dreams and gain inspiration from one another. A robust school outreach program is alsready underway across the world to encourage girls to hold meaningful conversations about their dreams and how to achieve them. The website for this campaign is www.LetGirlsDream.org.

Sitara: Let Girls Dream will join a growing slate of Netflix animated titles for families, which includes feature films Klaus from Sergio Pablos (launching on Netflix on November 15th) as well as The Willoughbys from Kris Pearn and Over The Moon from Glen Keane in 2020. Netflix’s growing slate of animated series from all over the world includes Dragons: Rescue Riders from DreamWorks Animation, Dino Girl Gauko from Akira Shigino, Kid Cosmic from Craig McCracken, Trash Truck from Max Keane, City of Ghosts from Elizabeth Ito, Centaurworld from Megan Nicole Dong, Maya and the Three from Jorge Gutierrez, Battle Kitty from Matt Layzell, and Mama K’s Team 4 from Malenga Mulendema.

Please find an image from the short here
ABOUT Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy (Headshot):

Sharmeen is a two-time Academy Award-winner and three-time Emmy Award-winner. She is known for her work in films that highlight the inequality of women. She is the only female director to have won two Academy Awards by the age of 37, and the first Pakistani to win an Academy Award. Since 2001, she has made over two dozen multi award films in over 16 countries around the world. Her films include STUDENT ATHLETE, GIRL IN THE RIVER, SONG OF LAHORE, SAVING FACE, PEACE KEEPERS and TRANSGENDERS: PAKISTAN’S OPEN SECRET.

In 2013, the Canadian government awarded her a Queen Elizabeth II Diamond Jubilee Medal for her work in the field of documentary films and the World Economic Forum honored her with a Crystal Award at their annual summit in Davos. In 2017 the International Center for Journalists awarded her the Knight International Journalism Award for her work that led to legislative change.

In 2012, Time Magazine included Sharmeen in their annual list of the 100 most influential people in the world. That same year the Pakistan Government awarded her with highest civil honor “Hilal-e-Imtiaz.”

In 2017, Sharmeen was the first artist to co-chair the “World Economic Forum” at Davos. Sharmeen holds a Bachelor’s degree from Smith College and two masters degrees from Stanford University. In 2018, Smith College awarded her an honorary degree in Fine Arts.