Cambodian filmmaker Kalyanee Mam's feature film directorial debut "A River Changes Course" won the 2013 Sundance Film Festival Grand Jury Prize for World Cinema Documentary last night.
Best known as the cinematographer for the Academy Award–winning documentary "Inside Job," Mam's first feature explores the damage rapid development has wrought in her native Cambodia on both a human and environmental level.
According to the filmmakers, rural communities in Cambodia used to reaping the bounty of their mountainous jungles and lush rivers, have witnessed their forests being cleared, land becoming scarce and costly, and fishing stocks rapidly depleting. No longer able to provide for their families, and often accruing massive debt as a result, many Cambodians have been forced to leave their rural lives behind to seek employment in the industrial factories of Phnom Penh.
Having escaped war-torn Cambodia in 1979, lawyer-turned-filmmaker Mam has sought to combine human rights and law in creating documentaries that are both captivating and inspiring.
Mam’s past work includes serving as cinematographer, associate producer and researcher for the 2011 Academy Award–winning documentary "Inside Job" about the global financial crisis. Her first documentary short, "Between Earth & Sky," followed the hopes and struggles of three young Iraqi refugees.
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