Filmmaking is a Spiritual Practice
Lessons from when I kept accidentally directing films in Ramadan.
Still from my new short, The Muslim Guide to Prayer in Space - www.prayerin.space
The Muslim Guide to Prayer in Space
The Director’s Guild of Canada recently asked me to write a “Happy Ramadan” message for our monthly newsletter. I wanted to take the opportunity to speak a little bit more personally on how I’ve come to understand that my faith tradition and artistic tradition are so deeply one and the same.
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Ramadan, the annual Muslim month of fasting, runs from February 17th until March 19th this year. It’s a beautiful time where we spend time with family, connect with community, and refrain from food and water from sunrise to sunset in an effort to grow our discipline, empathy, and sense of mindful presence.
I want to wish everyone a happy Ramadan 2026, and share what this month means to me as a director.
Because for four years in a row, I kept accidentally directing films in Ramadan.
In the summer of 2016, directing the pilot of what would become the 5-episode TELUS Original rom-com series Welcome to Surrey with 18-hour summertime fasts was easier said than done.
A still from Welcome to Surrey, a rom-com series that I co-wrote, directed, and starred in as the classic quirky “best friend”
Yet somehow, the experience deepened my connection to the work. It quieted the noise and brought a focused calm that, even directing subsequent films outside of Ramadan, has helped me understand how much of filmmaking is a spiritual experience.
As directors, we obsess over prep. Endless meetings and floorplans, storyboards and shotlists, re-doing schedules and debating the buttons on a character’s wardrobe. No stone left unturned.
But the day of filming inevitably arrives. And the only guarantee in your plan is that things are absolutely not going to go according to plan.
So we adjust.
You can’t change the weather. You can’t slow the clock. You can’t stop an actor from catching a cold. On a film set, you have no choice but to be present and accept what is.
Filmmaking and Ramadan both helped me hone in my ability to prepare like I can control everything, and to know how to surrender like I control nothing. Somewhere in between, the magic happens.
I’ve tried shifting my shoot dates to avoid the overlap, but the Islamic calendar is lunar, and Ramadan “shifts” ten days earlier every year. So when I directed Desi Standard Time Travel in Toronto in April 2022, there I was again. The intentionality and structure of Ramadan brought intentionality and structure into the film.
The cast, producer Shyam Valera and I break our fasts in rehearsals on Desi Standard Time Travel
Desi Standard Time Travel had the most Muslims I’d ever seen on set (six!). Instead of sunset just bringing the regular anxieties of losing light, my Muslim AD Dayyaan Jameel and I got to share that first bite of a date and first sip of water of the day together. Even cast and crew who weren’t fasting joined in. This practice going from something quiet and hidden to a little moment of celebration changed the energy in the room. That energy made it into the film.
This Ramadan, I’ll be at SXSW presenting the behind-the-scenes of my new short, The Muslim Guide to Prayer in Space. It’s the first film I’ve made that speaks directly to my experiences as a Muslim-Canadian, a wildly ambitious film set on a space station about a Malaysian astronaut figuring out what direction to pray in from orbit. At this point, presenting it at SXSW in the middle of Ramadan feels less like coincidence and more like a tradition I’ve come to truly love.
Still from The Muslim Guide to Prayer in Sipace, starring Osric Chau (Supernatural, DC’s Arrowverse)
Welcome to Surrey taught me that fasting could sharpen my work. Desi Standard Time Travel showed me I didn’t have to practice my faith alone on set. And The Muslim Guide to Prayer in Space let me put that faith at the centre of the story itself. Each project brought me a little closer to being fully present, as a director and as a Muslim, where my identity is an asset to bring to the work rather than baggage to be checked at the door.
May we all find ways to bring more of ourselves to the work. Whether you’re fasting this month or not, I hope you find your own version of that stillness. Prep like crazy and surrender like you trust the process.
See you at the movies. Ramadan Mubarak.
-Kashif
