Deepa Mehta

Mehta was born in Amritsar, Punjab[3] though her family moved to New Delhi while she was still a child, and her father worked as a film distributor. Subsequently, Mehta attended Welham Girls High School, boarding school in Dehradun on the foothills of Himalayas.[4] She graduated from the Lady Shri Ram College for Women, University of Delhi with a degree in Philosophy.[5]

After graduating Mehta began working for a production company that made documentary and educational films for the Indian government.[6] During the production of her first feature-length documentary focusing on the working life of a child bride,[6] she met and married Canadian documentary filmmaker Paul Saltzman, who was in India making a film. She migrated to Toronto to live with her husband in 1973.[7]

Once in Canada, Mehta and Saltzman along with Mehta's brother Dilip started Sunrise Films, a production company, initially producing documentaries but moved into television production creating the television series Spread Your Wings (1977–79) about the creative and artistic work of young people from around the world.[6] Additionally, Mehta directed several episodes of the Saltzman produced CBC drama Danger Bay (1984–90).[7]

Mehta also directed the documentaries At 99: A Portrait of Louise Tandy Murch (1975)[6] and Traveling Light (1986), the latter focusing on the work of Mehta's brother Dilip as a photojournalist. Traveling Light would go on to be nominated for three Gemini Awards. In 1987, based on the works of Alice Munro, Cynthia Flood and Betty Lambert, Mehta produced and co-directed Martha, Ruth and Edie. Screened at the Cannes International Film Festival, it would go on to win the Best Feature Film Award at the 11th International Film Festival in Florence in 1988.[6]

In 1991 she made her feature-film directorial debut with Sam & Me (starring Om Puri), a story of the relationship between a young Indian boy and an elderly Jewish gentleman in the Toronto neighbourhood of Parkdale. It broke the record at the time for the highest-budgeted film directed by a woman in Canada at $11 million.[7] It won Honorable Mention in the Camera d'Or category of the 1991 Cannes Film Festival. Mehta followed this with her film Camilla starring Bridget Fonda and Jessica Tandy in 1994. In 2002, she directed Bollywood/Hollywood, for which she won the Genie Award for Best Original Screenplay.[1]

Mehta directed two episodes of George Lucas' television series The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles.[8] The first episode, "Benares, January 1910", aired in 1993. The second episode was aired in 1996 as part of a TV movie titled Young Indiana Jones: Travels with Father.

Mehta directed several English-language films set in Canada, including The Republic of Love (2003) and Heaven on Earth (2008) which deals with domestic violence and has Preity Zinta playing the female lead. It premiered at the 2008 Toronto International Film Festival.[9] Also in 2008 Mehta produced the documentary The Forgotten Woman, directed by her brother Dilip.[7]

In 2015, Mehta wrote and directed the crime thriller Beeba Boys (2015), a film starring Randeep Hooda as Jeet Johar, a proud observant Sikh and a ruthless gangster. It premiered at the 2015 Toronto International Film Festival.[10]

On 29 October 2020, Telefilm Canada announced that Metha's film Funny Boy (2020) would represent Canada in the Academy Awards race for best international feature film.[11]

Many of Mehta's films across her career have focused on the duality of her national and cultural identity which has informed much of her filmmaking as she has been described as the "quintessential transnational filmmaker".[24] With her childhood and heritage informing her of key Indian and Hindu traditions, she has been seen to compare these practices with a more "Westernized" philosophy that has often resulted in controversy.[13] The production of her film Water was delayed by protests from Hindu fundamentalists whilst several of her other films releases have seen boycotts across India, including the film Fire.[13]

In Canada she met and married filmmaker Paul Saltzman whom she divorced in 1983. The couple have a daughter, Devyani Saltzman, an acclaimed author, curator and cultural critic.

Mehta is currently married to producer David Hamilton.[25] Her brother, Dilip Mehta, is a photojournalist and film director. He directed Cooking with Stella, which he co-wrote with Deepa.[5]

Mehta participated in a TV PSA for the charity Artists Against Racism, and is a member of the organization.[26]

In addition to her filmmaking awards, Mehta has received the following honors:

• Doctor of Laws, University of Victoria, 2009[28]
• Governor General's Performing Arts Awards for Lifetime Artistic Achievement, 2012[29]
• Doctor of Laws, Mount Allison University, 2013[30]
• Doctor of Letters, Concordia University, 2013[31]
• Member of the Order of Ontario, 2013[32]
• Officer of the Order of Canada, 2013[33]

• List of female film and television directors
• List of LGBT-related films directed by women
• South Asian Canadians in the Greater Toronto Area
• Women's cinema

• Beard, William; Jerry White (2002). "Deepa Mehta as Transnational Filmmaker". North of everything: English-Canadian cinema since 1980. University of Alberta. ISBN 978-0-88864-390-2.
• Levitin, Jacqueline; Judith Plessis; Valerie Raoul (2003). "25 An Introduction to Deepa Mehta: Making Films in Canada and India". Women Filmmakers: Refocusing. UBC Press. ISBN 978-0-7748-0903-0.

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Deepa Mehta.

• Deepa Mehta at IMDb
• Hamilton Mehta Productions
• Deepa Mehta In Profile, a short film tribute on her Governor General's Performing Arts Award, National Film Board of Canada website
• Deepa Mehta speaks with WSWS 15 May 2006 with Richard Phillips on the World Socialist Web Site