Danishka Esterhazy

Danishka Esterhazy is a Canadian screenwriter and film director. She is best known for her thriller and horror movies, such as Black Field, Level 16, The Banana Splits Movie, and the Slumber Party Massacre remake.

Career

Esterhazy is well known for her haunting stories and female-driven films. Her debut feature, Black Field, won the Best Feature Drama award at Vancouver's Women in Film Festival and the Best Canadian Feature award at Toronto's Female Eye Film Festival.
Esterhazy's films have screened in festivals and theaters and around the world including the Rome International Film Festival, the Puchon International Film Festival in South Korea, the Short Film Festival of India, La Maison Rouge in Paris and Kölner Filmhaus in Germany.
Her films have been broadcast on CBC Television, Bravo and Super Channel. Danishka is also a recipient of the Kodak New Vision Award for Most Promising Female Canadian Director awarded by Women in Film and Television Toronto. She also won the UBC Creative Writing Award for Best Screenplay at the 2015 Vancouver International Women in Film Festival.
She won the Canadian Screen Award for Best Direction in a TV Movie at the 10th Canadian Screen Awards in 2022, for I Was Lorena Bobbitt.

Education

Esterhazy graduated from the Canadian Film Centre and the National Screen Institute.

Filmography

Short film

Year	Title	Director	Writer	Producer	Editor	DoP
2002	Embowered
2004	Threefold
2005	The Snow Queen
2006	Protection
2009	The Red Hood
2009	Infectious
2012	Fallen

Feature film

Year	Title	Director	Writer	Producer
2003	Endings
2009	Black Field
2010	Suddenly Ever After
2011	The Trials of Rasputin
2013	H and G
2018	Level 16
2019	The Banana Splits Movie
2021	Slumber Party Massacre
2024	Killer Body Count
2025	Sniper: The Last Stand
2025	Match

Television

Year	Title	Director	Executive Producer	Notes
2001	Bullies – Not Cool!			Also editor
2011	Where the Funny Comes From
2020	Vagrant Queen			Episodes "Nobody's Queen" and "In a Sticky Spot"
2020	I Was Lorena Bobbitt			TV movie
2021–present	SurrealEstate			Directed 5 episodes
2022	Astrid & Lilly Save the World
2023	Ginny & Georgia			2 episodes