Shahid is a doctor an ENT (Ear Nose Throat) surgeon by background who has always loved film and cinema starting with his love of Indian cinema as a child. His interest in films and passion for writing and directing has made him commit to pursuing this as a career after finishing his medical work.
Whilst practicing as a doctor he recognised his unique skills commented on by his patients and fellow medical staff when treating his patients and especially young children with medical emergencies. This has aided his verbal and non-verbal skills in the direction of children on screen due to his compassion, patience and care and ability to give clear instructions. These skills have extended to all actors and crew members whilst at the same time using strong modern directorial techniques that he studied and learned during the acquisition of his diploma at the London Film Academy.
It was at the London Film Academy that he learned different aspects of film making. He has directed two previous highly successful short films, Cinnamon and Take the Chocolate which have won numerous national and international film festival awards between them and have been screened at a number of international film festivals once he completed his film school.
During his time at the London Film Academy, he produced one film and worked in different roles in several others to also learn other film crew roles in detail, a skill which he states has helped him become a better director on set. He was taught by people such as Jan Harlan (Executive Producer- Eyes wide shut/ The Shining), John Ward (Cinematographer), Mervyn Gerard (Sound mixer) and lots of other talented people from the British film industry.
Shahid is a multi-award winning director and has won 21 Best Director Awards for Matty Boy, 49 Best Director Awards for Cinnamon and 18 Best Director Awards for Take the Chocolate to date.
Shahid is now working on a feature film that he is co-writing with his friend and producer of Matty Boy, Dr Samir Srivastava and is looking forward to completing his first feature length film shortly.
Dr Samir Srivastava is a filmmaker and consultant forensic psychiatrist who has a great passion for film making. He is a producer and he also co-writes with his good friend Dr Shahid Kamal for short films, feature films and other projects such as children’s web series episodes and adult episodic series spanning different genres. Dr Srivastava is a Fellow of the Royal College of Psychiatrists (FRCPsych) and is also a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts (FRSA).
Samir met Shahid in 2006 when they were both junior doctors and became good friends. Shahid took a career break from medicine to follow his passion for filmmaking and achieved a diploma from the London Film Academy. Shahid started creating and writing short films. Following this, Samir collaborated with Shahid in the filmmaking process and at first started by consulting on script and story development in 2012 and 2013.
Samir’s passion for film making grew with each new project and with Shahid’s expertise in directing, he started to produce and co-write with Shahid on 3 short films projects that have now 617 film awards in total. They are currently writing a feature film script they believe will touch people’s hearts called, “Your heart and my soul”.
Samir’s first fully produced short film, ‘Matty Boy’ has won 323 awards at international film festivals around the world to date and he has individually won 4 ‘Best First Time Producer Award’ and 51 Best Producer Awards’.
Parisa is a talented administrator who is head of communications and can be reached at peopleproductionsltd@gmail.com where she is first point of contact for the company.
As well as producing, Samir also enjoys writing with Shahid and collaborating in all mediums of film.
Matty Boy
co-writers Dr Samir Srivastava and Dr Shahid kamal
Take The Chocolate
written by Dr Shahid Kamal
Cinnamon
co-writers- Dr Shahid Kamal nd Dr Sinan Ucknan
Script Consultant- Dr Samir Srivastava
Dr Samir also recently enjoyed narrating on the recent short web series collaboration, “Katy Cutie and Ashu and the Funny Mouse” and strongly believes that he and Shahid have a purpose to entertain and at the same time, to give positive and uplifting messages within film that can help people of all ages. They have a particular passion for entertaining and educating children.
Dr Samir was on an international panel of speakers hosted by iHollywood Film Festival in October 2021. He spoke on a virtual panel about how to make films that win awards at international film festivals given his success to share this with film makers from all levels of experience and from different countries. This was received well and by the international audience and from the feedback from iHollywood film festival.
“It was a pleasure to have Dr. Samir Srivastava on iHollywood Film Fest panels. His films won 5 awards in our 2021 festival measured by traditional film festival standards as well as energetic frequency. We were impressed by his breadth of storytelling across genres including character development, insight, perspective and the ability to work with small children.
Dr. Srivastava’s experience as a producer, co-writer for People Productions Limited UK, and his insight into producing high quality films that are worthy to win so many awards globally were beneficial to our international audience. The feedback we received was extremely positive. He is always a delight to listen to and hear his insights and we appreciate his willingness to share.”
Joyce Chow
Founder & Festival Director iHollywood Film Fest
Entertainment Editor | Auto News
ihollywoodfilmfest.com