Film – Philadelphia
Amanda Danziger’s passion for film and cinematography began in 2008 when she was a student at Drexel University in Philadelphia. As a way to show her appreciation to those who financed her upcoming Rwanda mission trip, Amanda bought a camera and set out to film her experience. She created a short documentary called “Umuryango,” about the street children she met at an orphanage in Byimana, many of whom were orphaned by the 1994 Rwandan Genocide. After this experience, Amanda was hooked on the idea of linking together volunteer work and film. She recognized the power of film as a medium to confront western culture with the raw living conditions of the third world. Ferasha Films was born.
In 2009 Amanda volunteered to go to India to film her second documentary, “Threads of Hope,” the story of impoverished women at ConneXions, a fair trade vocational school in Kolkata, India and for which she received a scholarship from the McKnight Fund to finance the project. On the heels of this documentary’s success, Amanda was inspired to expand the reach of Ferasha Films by building a crew to film her first feature documentary, “The Backyard Philly Project.”
Most recently, Amanda was recognized in Drexel Magazine’s “40 under 40” for connecting her visual arts talents and compassion for the poor.
She loves her husband, her twin boys, filmmaking, photography, indie music, chocolate, zombies and three-day weekends. She admits it can be a challenge, but she knows she’s got a really cool day job.