Debuting at the Sundance Film Festival after a lengthy, six-year development period that included writing, financing and finally filming (including 18 days in Winnipeg last April and May), Amreeka may be the rare autobiographical tale that's been toned down from the harshness of real life.

Born in Ohio to Palestinian/Jordanian parents in 1976, writer/director Cherien Dabis witnessed first-hand at 14 how the Gulf War created more than a tinge of racism in her community.

Weaving those startling moments of personal revelation into her film while updating the timeframe to be more politically relevant, Dabis has succeeded in creating a comedy-inflected drama that imposes no boundaries on its protagonist, Muna - a woman trying to adapt to a new country.

Educated at Columbia University and a former staff writer on The L Word, Dabis has always wanted Amreeka to be her first film, and her unerring, clear-focused drive has enabled it to come to fruition.

Uptown recently spoke with Dabis amidst her hectic schedule of meetings for upcoming projects.

Uptown: How much of Amreeka is drawn from your own life?

Dabis: I like to call it loosely semi-autobiographical. Some of the things that happened in the film happened to us - my father was a physician who lost a lot of his patients because they didn't want to see an Arab doctor.

Actually, in real life things got worse than they do in the movie. My mom wasn't allowed to shop in certain stores because other customers threatened to boycott. And the local newspaper started publishing letters to the editor suggesting that we should leave town. I think it reached the pinnacle when the Secret Service showed up at my high school to investigate a tip they got that my 17-year-old sister was allegedly planning to kill the president.

Were there any films and filmmakers that inspired you throughout the entire Amreeka process?

Stylistically, I was looking more towards natural realism, and the work of Robert Altman, John Cassavetes and Spike Lee. I tried to work around the choreography of the actors, as the blocking is central to everything. We allowed them to be organic and dynamic, and would only then adjust our plans according to their movements - we did all of that, but within certain parameters.

I looked to Truffaut and The 400 Blows, because that's a very intimate film. I also really admire Jim Sheridan (In America) and Ang Lee (The Ice Storm), and their storytelling in many ways, because a lot of it is personal. Other times, too, they look at political events from a humanist perspective.

When did you decide to set the film in 2003 as opposed to the early '90s?

What happened in 1991 (the Gulf War) was a big, life-changing event for me, and I became obsessed with the media. I noticed that they were really perpetuating stereotypes and I decided I wanted to do something to change that. I wanted to get our side of the story out there.

Ten years later, I found myself in New York, starting film school. I happened to move days before 9/11. So, I was in the city during the whole ordeal and the invasion of 2003, and it reminded me of everything that happened in 1991.

I wanted to take the spirit of what happened to us and make it more relatable. And, since the invasion of '03 was still fresh in people's minds, I thought there was really no reason to set it in 1991.

It made everything more contemporary and, I feel, more effective.

Amreeka opens at Grant Park on Oct. 30.