Born in Chennai, India, Rama Rau has worked at every level of a film set, sometimes as the only female on massive film crews in Bollywood, India, where she learnt all things filmmaking. Immigrating to Canada, she started making documentaries and has made several award winning films, including critically acclaimed Opening Night movie for Hot Docs – LEAGUE OF EXOTIQUE DANCERS, about aging burlesque dancers in Las Vegas. She’s also had her first fiction short at the Cannes Film Festival’s Court Metrages and her fiction feature HONEY BEE, starring Julia Sarah Stone and Martha Plimpton, won the Best Film Awards at the Whistler Film Festival, the Canadian Film Festival and a LEO Award for Julia. Her new script RUNAWAYS set in India is a CFC-Netflix Development Accelerator project. The United Nations has invited her documentary THE DAUGHTER TREE to be screened at multiple cities across Europe. Her script for QUEEN, about North America’s first burlesque dancer to shatter race barriers was a Finalist at the prestigious New York Women Writers’ Lab run by Nicole Kidman. Equally at ease directing action or emotional scenes, Rau brings a unique voice to her work as a director of stories with strong female protagonists going through life-changing experiences. Her work has been featured on Sundance Now, ARTE France, ZDF Germany, Al Jazeera, NRK (Norway), YLE Finland, CBC and TVO. She is currently in development on several features and two series.
Awards & Nominations
Honey Bee (feature film)
2018 Best Feature Film, Borsos Award, Whistler Film Festival
2018 Best Feature Film, Canadian Film Festival
2018 Best Film, North Dakota Film Festival
2019 Best Female Lead in a Motion Picture, (Julia Sarah Stone),
League of Exotique Dancers (feature documentary)
2016 Opening Night Film, Hot Docs International Film Festival
2016 Best Canadian Film: NorthwestFest
The Market (documentary)
2013 Nomination,Canadian Screen Awards:
– Donald Brittain Award for Best Social Political Documentary
– Best Original Music in a Documentary
2013 Best Director Golden Panda, Sichuan Film Festival, China
2012 Best Director, Stuttgart Film Festival
2010 Best of International Showcase, Sunnyside Film Festival, La Rochelle, France.