Sunset in Storrs is at —.
I am a filmmaker, writer, and teacher. I make short films about people who cannot say what they feel. From Lahore, Pakistan. Working in Storrs, Connecticut.
The fundamental power of the cinematic medium is to generate empathy.
Two narrative shorts. One finished, one nearly.
In post-production.
A broke, aging handyman has one Fourth of July to scrape together enough money to stop a funeral home from “disposing” of his dead son’s remains.
A working-class drama about grief, dignity, and the quiet cruelty of institutions. Shot in Willimantic, Connecticut, and the towns around it, with a local cast and crew, because the story belongs to that landscape.
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A photographer takes his student into the hills to teach him how to see. He has not told him it is the last sunset he will ever photograph.
Long takes, an overcast sky, and one sunset. I made it as my thesis film at Beaconhouse National University with Chal Phir Cinema, a Lahore collective working to bring audiences back to independent film.
A book, an experiment, a channel, and the day job.
A five-year-old waits every night for his magic stones, which take him to a world with everything he wants except his parents. I wrote it during my engineering degree. It placed in a national short story competition and became my first book.
Read about the bookA seated VR companion to Pay the Difference. A series of institutional waiting rooms where you can sit, look, and listen, and nothing you do helps. I am testing whether taking agency away says more about institutions than simulating action does.
My YouTube channel of video essays and close readings of films from around the world. Where my teaching and my cinephilia meet.
Watch the channel
I wrote the concepts, scripts, and storyboards for television spots for real-estate projects, then directed the animators and editors who built them. I was also assistant director on a television anthology series for Express Entertainment. This is where I learned to tell a clear visual story under real constraints.
I went to engineering school and came out a filmmaker.
I trained as a civil engineer at the University of Engineering & Technology in Lahore. In my third year a friend showed me films from outside Pakistan. One of them was Bergman’s Scenes from a Marriage. I watched it in one sitting and knew what I wanted to do. I finished the degree in 2020. I have not built a bridge.
I had been writing since before the degree. A short story placed in a national competition and became a novella. Screenwriting followed, then a master’s in Film & Television at Beaconhouse National University, summa cum laude, and a thesis film that traveled to festivals on three continents. Between degrees I wrote and directed commercials and assisted on television drama in Pakistan.
I now write and direct short films about characters who go unseen, unheard, or misunderstood, and teach film writing and film theory at the University of Connecticut, where I am completing an MFA in Digital Media & Design. I shoot in long takes, so the audience has time to do its own looking. Wherever you are from, I have probably watched a film from your country.
Films allow us to reflect on our shared imperfections as human beings, a fact that humbles us. This reflection compels us to be more empathetic, teaching us that we all share the same human struggle. A thought which also makes us feel a little less lonely.
From my artist statement
My second favorite thing, after making films. I have been Instructor of Record in Digital Media & Design at the University of Connecticut since 2025, and was teaching assistant in the same courses the year before.
A screenwriting course. Students develop original short screenplays from idea to polished draft and workshop each other’s pages. I teach it in fall 2025 and fall 2026.
A close-reading course built around individual directors and their bodies of work. Students analyze films in writing and in video essays. I taught it in spring 2025.
I will collect screenplays from Film Writing and video essays from Auteur Study here, with their authors’ permission.
My degrees, honors, service, and papers.
For festivals, collaborations, teaching, or to argue about Haneke.
Bishop Center, University of Connecticut, Storrs. I write and speak in English, اردو, سِنڌِي, and Punjabi.