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Meet Geeta Gandbhir, Indian origin director who has two separate films nominated for Oscars 2026
Indian American filmmaker Geeta Gandbhir is the director of two films nominated for the 2026 Academy Awards.
As the 2026 Oscars race heats up, a few lucky performers have found themselves to have secured multiple nominations. But rarer among them is American filmmaker Geeta Gandbhir, who is making waves in this year’s Oscar documentary race. Geeta, an Indian origin filmmaker, has earned two nominations for two different films.
Her film The Perfect Neighbor is nominated in the best documentary feature category, while The Devil is Busy is in the running for best documentary short.
Both films were already on the Academy’s shortlist of 15 before nominations were announced, so Geeta knew she had a strong chance. Still, the moment itself caught her off guard.
“Don’t judge me. I slept through the nominations. I was so anxious the night before. I planned to go to bed early and sleep well, but I was awake until three in the morning staring at the ceiling. Iliterally sleptthrough the announcements,” she told Reuters at the Independent Spirit Awards.
Who is Geeta Gandbhir?
Geeta Gandbhir was born in Boston in 1970. Her father, Sharad emigrated from India to the US in the 60s to study engineering and settled there. Her mother, Lalita, joined him after 1965. Geeta grew up in Boston with her two siblings. Her brother, Ashwin, is also a filmmaker, while her sister, Una, is a superior court judge in Alaska. Geeta was introduced to Spike Lee while she was studying at Harvard University, and she began her career working for him, before branching out into documentary filmmaking. For her work as a film editor, she has won two Emmys in the Outstanding Picture Editing for Nonfiction Programming category.
Geeta Gandbhir's two Oscar nominations
Two of Geeta's films are competing for the top prize at this year's Academy Awards. The Devil is Busy, distributed by HBO Max, offers a gripping, ground‑level look at a day inside an abortion clinic in Atlanta, Georgia, highlighting the dangers that staff and patients face amid America’s shifting political landscape. On the other hand, The Perfect Neighbor, distributed by Netflix, examines the events leading up to the killing of Ajike Owens in a Florida neighborhood, reconstructing the incident through police calls and body‑camera footage.
Talking about the two films at the Oscars Luncheon, Gandbhir said, “Both were made with so much love and attention—and also with my family. The Perfect Neighbor is made with my sister‑in‑law and my husband; they’re producers on it. And The Devil is Busy is co-directed with my best friend from college.”
Geeta believes the category is political. “When you look at all my colleagues who are nominated in these categories, the films are deeply political. They all have something to say... about a pressing issue in some way,” she told AFP.
The fate of Geeta's films will be decided at the 98th Academy Awards in Los Angeles on March 15.
