Immigrating to the United States at the age of 15, Faisal graduated magna cum laude from UC Berkeley with a degree in Rhetoric. Though his studies included everything from postmodern theory to Urdu poetry, it was in Political Cinema, a class taught by acclaimed theorist Kaja Silverman and German avant-garde filmmaker Harun Farocki, that Faisal came to fully appreciate how effectively film can challenge assumptions and influence perceptions.

A career in film

For nearly two decades, Faisal has worked extensively as an editor in New York City. With an eye for story and an artist’s touch, Faisal has cut commercials, documentaries, narrative films and television shows. His work includes the Oscar-nominated documentary short, St. Louis Superman; Without Shepherds, a Grand Prize Winner at the Brooklyn Film Festival that he edited and co-produced; and Salar, which won Best Dramatic Short at the Austin Film Festival and was shortlisted for an Academy Award. Faisal’s latest film, which he wrote, edited, and co-directed, is the upcoming feature documentary The Bad-Ass Librarians of Timbuktu, based loosely on the New York Times bestselling book of the same name. Over the course of his career, Faisal has edited pieces for National Geographic, Dan Rather Reports, USA Network, Al Jazeera, FiveThirtyEight, and Sports Illustrated. His work has been featured at Sundance, Tribeca, Clermont-Ferrand, BFI London, Big Sky, Palm Springs, Slamdance, and Hot Docs, where he has also pitched live in the high-stakes forum. Faisal has served as an Emmy Awards judge and was selected as part of the inaugural cohort of fellows for Diversity in the Edit Room, an initiative of the Karen Schmeer Film Editing Fellowship that promotes the careers of exceptional minority editors.

Ways of seeing

After shaping countless visual narratives, moving into work that is more personally expressive has been a natural evolution for Faisal. In addition to photography and a book of short stories in progress, Faisal co-wrote H8, a TV pilot script that won Second Place in WeScreenplay’s 2018 TV pilot contest. As a screenwriter, Faisal is represented by Zero Gravity Management.