Santa Barbara International Film Festival To Showcase Three NFB Films By Women Directors

The Santa Barbara International Film Festival will present three award-winning films from the National Film Board of Canada during its 41st edition, which runs February 4–14, 2026. The selection highlights stories of resilience told by women filmmakers and includes two NFB feature documentaries making their U.S. premieres, along with a newly released animated short.

The films include In the Room, directed by Brishkay Ahmed, which will receive its U.S. premiere. The 75-minute documentary follows five Afghan women living in exile whose shared commitment to freedom and equality brings them to the global stage as they reflect on Afghanistan’s personal and political history. The film received the Audience Award at its world premiere in the Vancouver International Film Festival’s Showcase program. Ahmed will attend the Santa Barbara screening alongside several of the film’s subjects, including Afghan-Canadian author, journalist, and filmmaker Nelofer Pazira-Fisk; Vancouver-based performer and women’s rights advocate Mozhdah Jamalzadah; actor and former athlete Sahar Parniyan, now living in the United Kingdom; and Afghan-American actor and model Vida Samadzai.

Also making its U.S. premiere is There Are No Words, a 98-minute documentary by Toronto-based filmmaker Min Sook Lee. The film examines Lee’s search for memories of her mother, Song Ji Lee, who died by suicide when the director was 12, while also exploring her father’s past work in South Korea’s national intelligence agency during the Park Chung Hee dictatorship of the 1960s. The film has received the DOC Institute Best Documentary Award at the Toronto Reel Asian International Film Festival and an Honourable Mention for Best Canadian Feature Film at the Toronto International Film Festival.

Completing the lineup is The Sounds of Things Ablaze, a 6-minute, 35-second animated short by visual artist Hayat Najm. Created using charcoal-drawn animation, the film follows a woman whose daily movements are shaped by memories of war. Najm, who came to Canada from Lebanon as a child, created the film as her first animated short. It recently won Best Animation at the New York City Short Film Festival.