In 2016 he premiered his feature directorial debut ’The Loner' at the Tribeca Film Festival in New York to outstanding critical acclaim. A neon-noir set in the Persian and Russian opium underworld of Los Angeles, the Financial Times accused him of having "spiked the tonic of open-mindedness with firewater.” The film will release in 2017 and there are talks of a series adaptation for HBO. Daniel also produced the Sundance hit ‘A Girl Walks Home Alone At Night’, a feminist Persian vampire Western, which has played in theatres and festival all over the world and already taken up cult status.

“For me cinema is about reflecting unique ideas about the culture and society we live in”, Daniel said. “The best films have given me fresh eyes and changed and challenged my preconceptions. We live in a time where art has the possibility to reach incredibly large audiences, the world over. Given our current geopolitical climate, I think there’s an opportunity for artists and filmmakers to ask hard questions about the society we live in and really challenge the status quo. I think we’re going to see a lot of artists try and push the envelope and really test and taunt the culture, in order to push the needle when it comes to feminism, the environment and secularism”.

When asked about his experience at UWC, Daniel said: “My experience at UWC was cosmopolitan, multicultural and cultivated in me a respect for others. Much of my career is the same. I’m constantly asking myself how can I reflect stories that open the audience up to “otherness”. Much of cinema and television tends to fit neatly into a national or linguistic category and upholds the limits of that category. French cinema for France. Swedish for Sweden. Israeli for Israel. I try to find natural stories that reflect the diverse and globalised nature of the world that I grew up in and live in today. In this respect I look for co-productions (eg. Singapore-Australia, Thailand-France) that can speak to multiple territories at once and build cultural understanding between them. I’m heartened when I meet a young woman who grew up in Catholic Poland who tells me ‘A Girl Walks Home Alone At Night’ (a black and white Farsi language movie about a female vampire in a chador) is one of her favourite films”.