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Rachel Grady
Grady at the Miami Film Festival presentation of "Norman Lear: Just Another Version of You"
Nationality	American
Occupation	Filmmaker

Rachel Grady is an American film director and producer. She has her own production company, Loki Films, which primarily focuses on documentary style filmmaking, often highlighting contentious religious narratives. In 2008 Grady won a Women of Vision Award.

Career

Loki Films

Many of Grady’s prominent film projects have been co-directed and produced by her friend and business partner, Heidi Ewing. Meeting in 1997, Ewing and Grady found comradery in their similar approaches to creative projects. Soon thereafter, the two founded Loki Films in 2001, a production company that specializes in films, both short and feature length, television and commercials.

Grady and Ewing approach their filmmaking with the conviction that “we are interested in the nuances of the human experience and all of its colours and contours. We have found that in fundamentalist circles, you can learn a lot about human nature…you are asked to believe things that perhaps the majority of society doesn’t agree with.”

Being a co-directing team, Grady and Ewing come up with an initial plan and outsource locations and subjects together. From there, the directors separate to conduct solo interviews and filming. When all the footage has been shot, the duo reconvenes to the ending room and compiles their respective material to create their ideal film.

Film topics

Specializing in documentary filmmaking, Grady and Ewing have tackled many controversial topics in their films although reject the idea that they are “advocacy filmmakers” and prefer to have the subjects guide the thrust of their stories.

2006’s Jesus Camp explores an evangelical Christian summer camp for children. Scolar Michael Friesen says that Jesus Camp raises “important questions about the children's psychological development in a milieu of strong religion.” Following the release of the film, the camp was forced to close down after garnering negative attention from her portrayal in the film. Grady and Ewing have been accused of misrepresentation of the religion and approaching the film with an agenda.

Loki films' feature documentary One of Us debuted on Netflix in 2017. The film delves into the relatively concealed world of Brooklyn’s Hasidic Jewish community.

Said Grady on developing the framework for One of Us, “we started the film with what we always start all projects with which is personal interest, curiosity.” The film intimately deals with the themes of domestic and sexual abuse and the great lengths individuals must go to remove themselves from the community. Grady described the individuals who decided to leave their orthodox communities as “having an enormous amount of bravery and desperation.”

Writer David Edelstein of Vulture said that Grady and Ewing did not attempt to make an “objective documentary” but noted the difficultly it would be to infiltrate the Hasidic community to obtain their side of the controversial stories.

Awards

Jesus Camp premiered at the 2006 Tribeca Film Festival and was nominated for Best Documentary Feature at the 79^thAcademy Awards. Detropia was placed on the shortlist for the 85^thand Academy Awards and One of Us garnered critical acclaim with a 96% rating on Rotten Tomatoes.

Personal Life

Grady is a single mother to a son born in 2010 via an anonymous sperm donor. Grady said about her decision to use a sperm donor, “I have a good career, an amazing mother, great friends. I feel satisfied. I can do this myself,” noting the separation between marriage and motherhood as a reason to no longer put off starting a family.