Knife: The Attempted Murder of Salman Rushdie, screening in the Festival’s Premieres section, is a harrowing, intimate documentary that confronts the 2022 attack that nearly took Rushdie’s life — and refuses to look away. Told largely in Rushdie’s own words, the film traces the stabbing itself, the brutal aftermath, and the long, uncertain road back. It is unflinching, at times graphic. You can feel the audience brace as it unfolds.
Director Gibney structures the film around Rushdie’s recovery — physical, psychological, creative — using previously unseen footage captured by Rushdie’s wife, poet and photographer Rachel Eliza Griffiths. What begins as private documentation slowly becomes something else. Rushdie admits during the post-screening Q&A that he never imagined showing so much of his body on camera. “I’m a novelist,” he jokes. “I thought she’d taken a couple of snaps on her iPhone.” Instead, a film emerged.
Tickets available for the following screenings:
Jan 27, 9:15PM MST - Rose Wagner Center Salt Lake City
Jan 29, 11:15 AM MST - Eccles Theater, Park City
All other screenings sold out.
Read more from the Q&A:
bit.ly/3Z32gKR