Director’s Bio

Saro Varjabedian, a Queen’s native of Armenian descent is an award winning International Cinematographer and Director. As a Cinematographer, Saro has photographed nine feature films, one feature documentary, several web-series and countless shorts. He has filmed internationally in Cuba, Armenia, France, Lebanon, Mexico and India. His work on the short film “Jesus Loves Yusef” has won Saro the Best Student Cinematography Award at the 2012 Palm Springs International Film Festival. “Elliot Loves” a feature film, which Saro photographed, has aired on HBO Latino, HBO Zone, HBO Comedy, HBO Go, Cinemax, Cinemax Go and Hulu. “The Traveller” an International Lebanese/French Co-Production feature film has screened at the 2017 Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival, the 2018 Dubai International Film Festival and was nominated for Best Cinematography at the 2017 Woodstock Film Festival and 2018 Lebanese Movie Awards. He has also photographed the international Bulgarian/Cuban Feature film entitled, “Havana Darkness” and the international Bulgarian/Mexican Feature film entitled, “Welcome to Acapulco” which are currently available on VOD platforms. Saro has most recently photographed the feature film, “The Scrapper” and he is slated to photograph the Indie thriller “Greenport”.

As a director, Saro has directed five short films, a feature film and a TV Pilot. Most notable, is his short film entitled, “After Water There is Sand,” which has screened at several International film festivals, including the 2013 International Golden Apricot Film Festival, the 2012 International Pomegranate Film Festival, the 2012 Arpa Film Festival, the 2013 Boston International Film Festival, the 2013 International Family Film Festival and the 2013 Women and Minorities in Media film festival. He directed the TV series entitled, “The Ridge” which aired on Amazon Prime. Saro’s wrote, directed and photographed his first feature “Respite” which is out now on most VOD platforms. And Saro has written a feature script on the 1960 winning Olympic American Ice Hockey team entitled “Squaw Valley” currently in development. Saro is currently developing the docuseries entitled “Driving the Green Book”. Saro is a recent Columbia MFA Graduate and has taught cinematography and directing at New York Film Academy.