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I'm a storyteller,

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but I'm also a troublemaker.

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(Laughter)

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And I have a habit
of asking difficult questions.

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It started when I was 10 years old,

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and my mother, who was raising
six children, had no time for them.

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At 14, fed up with my increasingly
annoying questions,

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she recommended that I begin writing
for the local English-language newspaper

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in Pakistan,

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to put my questions out
to the entire country, she said.

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(Laughter)

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At 17, I was an undercover
investigative journalist.

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I don't even think my editor knew
just how young I was

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when I sent in a story
that named and shamed

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some very powerful people.

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The men I'd written about
wanted to teach me a lesson.

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They wanted to shame me and my family.

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They spray-painted my name
and my family's name

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with unspeakable profanities
across our front gate

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and around our neighborhood.

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And they felt that my father,
who was a strict man of tradition,

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would stop me.

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Instead, my father stood
in front of me and said,

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"If you speak the truth,
I will stand with you,

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and so will the world."

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And then he got --

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(Applause)

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And then he got a group of people together
and they whitewashed the walls.

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(Laughter)

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I've always wanted my stories
to jolt people,

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to shake them into having
difficult conversations.

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And I felt that I would be more effective
if I did something visual.

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And so at 21, I became
a documentary filmmaker,

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turning my camera
onto marginalized communities

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on the front lines in war zones,

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eventually returning home to Pakistan,

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where I wanted to document
violence against women.

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Pakistan is home to 200 million people.

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And with its low levels of literacy,

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film can change the way
people perceive issues.

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An effective storyteller
speaks to our emotions,

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elicits empathy and compassion,

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and forces us to look
at things differently.

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In my country, film had the potential
to go beyond cinema.

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It could change lives.

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The issues that I've always
wanted to raise --

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I've always wanted to hold up
a mirror to society --

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they've been driven
by my barometer of anger.

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And my barometer of anger
led me, in 2014, to honor killings.

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Honor killings take place
in many parts of the world,

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where men punish women
who transgress rules made by them:

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women who choose
to marry on their own free will;

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or women who are looking for a divorce;

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or women who are suspected
of having illicit relationships.

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In the rest of the world, honor killings
would be known as murder.

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I always wanted to tell that story
from the perspective of a survivor.

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But women do not live to tell their tale

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and instead end up in unmarked graves.

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So one morning when
I was reading the newspaper,

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and I read that a young woman
had miraculously survived

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after being shot in the face
by her father and her uncle

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because she chose to marry a man
out of her free will,

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I knew I had found my storyteller.

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Saba was determined to send
her father and her uncle to jail,

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but in the days after
leaving the hospital,

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pressure mounted on her to forgive.

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You see, there was a loophole in the law

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that allowed for victims
to forgive perpetrators,

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enabling them to avoid jail time.

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And she was told
that she would be ostracized

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and her family, her in-laws,

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they would all be shunned
from the community,

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because many felt that her father
had been well within his right,

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given her transgression.

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She fought on --

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for months.

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But on the final day in court,

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she gave a statement forgiving them.

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As filmmakers, we were devastated,

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because this was not the film
that we had set out to make.

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In hindsight, had she pressed charges,
fought the case and won,

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hers would have been an exception.

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When such a strong woman is silenced,

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what chance did other women have?

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And we began to think about using our film

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to change the way people
perceived honor killings,

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to impact the loophole in the law.

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And then our film was nominated
for an Academy Award,

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and honor killings became headline news,

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and the prime minister,
while sending his congratulations,

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offered to host the first screening
of the film at his office.

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Of course, we jumped at the chance,

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because no prime minister in the history
of the country had ever done so.

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And at the screening,

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which was carried live
on national television,

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he said something that reverberated
throughout the country:

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"There is no honor
in honor killings," he said.

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(Applause)

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At the Academy Awards in LA,

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many of the pundits had written us off,

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but we felt that in order
for the legislative push to continue,

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we needed that win.

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And then, my name was announced,

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and I bounded up the steps in flip-flops,
because I didn't expect to be onstage.

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(Laughter)

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And I accepted the statue,
telling a billion people watching

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that the prime minister of Pakistan
had pledged to change the law,

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because, of course, that's one way
of holding the prime minister accountable.

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(Laughter)

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And --

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(Applause)

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Back home, the Oscar win
dominated headline news,

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and more people joined the fray,

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asking for the loophole
in the law to be closed.

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And then in October 2016,
after months of campaigning,

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the loophole was indeed closed.

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(Applause)

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And now men who kill women
in the name of honor

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receive life imprisonment.

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(Applause)

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Yet, the very next day,

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a woman was killed in the name of honor,

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and then another and another.

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We had impacted legislation,

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but that wasn't enough.

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We needed to take the film
and its message to the heartland,

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to small towns and villages
across the country.

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You see, for me, cinema can play
a very positive role

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in changing and molding society
in a positive direction.

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But how would we get to these places?

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How would we get to
these small towns and villages?

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We built a mobile cinema,

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a truck that would roll through
the length and breadth of the country,

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that would stop
in small towns and villages.

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We outfitted it with a large screen
that would light up the night sky,

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and we called it "Look But With Love."

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It would give the community
an opportunity to come together

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and watch films in the evening.

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We knew we could attract men and children
in the mobile cinema.

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They would come out and watch.

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But what about women?

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In these small, rural communities
that are segregated,

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how would we get women to come out?

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We had to work with prevailing
cultural norms in order to do so,

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and so we built a cinema
inside the cinema,

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outfitting it with seats and a screen
where women could go inside and watch

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without fearing

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or being embarrassed

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or harassment.

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We began to introduce everyone

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to films that opened up their minds
to competing worldviews,

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encouraging children
to build critical thinking

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so that they could ask questions.

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And we expanded our scope
beyond honor killings,

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talking about income inequality,

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the environment,

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talking about ethnic relations,
religious tolerance and compassion.

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And inside, for women,

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we showed them films
in which they were heroes, not victims,

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and we told them how they could navigate
the court system, the police system,

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educating them about their rights,

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telling them where they could seek refuge

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if they were victims of domestic violence,

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where they could go and get help.

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We were surprised that we were
welcomed in so many of the places

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that we went to.

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Many of the towns had never seen
television or social media,

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and they were eager
for their children to learn.

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But there was also pushback and blowback

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with the ideas that
we were bringing with us.

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Two members of our mobile
cinema team resigned

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because of threats from villages.

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And in one of the villages
that we were screening in,

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they shut it down

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and said they didn't want the women
to know about their rights.

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But on the flip side, in another village
when a screening was shut down,

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a plainclothes policeman got up
and ordered it back on,

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and stood by, protecting our team,

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telling everyone that it was his duty
to expose the young minds

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to an alternative worldview
and to this content.

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He was an ordinary hero.

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But we've come across
so many of these heroes on our journey.

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In another town, where the men said
that only they could watch

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and the women had to stay home,

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a community elder got up,

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got a group of people together,
had a discussion,

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and then both men and women
sat down to watch together.

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We are documenting what we are doing.

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We talk to people.

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We adapt.

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We change the lineup of films.

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When we show men films

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that show perpetrators
of violence behind bars,

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we want to hit home the fact
that if men are violent,

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there will be repercussions.

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But we also show films where men
are seen as championing women,

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because we want to encourage them
to take on those roles.

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For women, when we show them films
in which they are heads of state

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or where they are lawyers
and doctors and in leadership positions,

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we talk to them and encourage them
to step into those roles.

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We are changing the way
people in these villages interact,

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and we're taking our learnings
into other places.

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Recently, a group contacted us
and wants to take our mobile cinema

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to Bangladesh and Syria,

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and we're sharing our learnings with them.

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We feel it's really important

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to take what we are doing
and spread it across the world.

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In small towns and villages
across Pakistan,

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men are changing the way
they interact with women,

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children are changing
the way they see the world,

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one village at a time, through cinema.

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Thank you.

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(Applause)