Ms.Lanka Bandaranayake was born in Anuradhapura, Sri Lanka. She started her career as an actress in 1998. Her debut short film 'Tradition' was made in 2016. The film was screened at over 50 international film festivals, including Open Doors screenings at the Locarno Film Festival in 2018, Cannes Corner, a Festival de Cannes in 2017, France, and the 21st Toronto Reel Asian International Film Festival 2017, Canada…etc. The film won a jury special award at the 9th SAARC Film Festival, 2019, Sri Lanka; best short film (film student award) at the 12th Jogja-NETPAC Asian Film Festival 2017, Indonesia; best cinematography at the "Euro Kino" Czech International Film Festival 2017, Czech Republic; and 2nd best film at the National Youth Cinematic Harvest 2016, Sri Lanka.
In 2020, Lanka made “Inheritance” with the partnership of the British Council Sri Lanka in the Female Filmmakers First program, and the short film won the jury special award at the Colombo International Women’s Film Festival 2020, Sri Lanka. Her short film Mahasona (2021) was selected for various film festivals, including the Tasveer South Asian Film Festival 2021 in Washington, USA, and distributed on their TV platform. Since then, she has been making several short films, and her films problematize gender inequality in Sri Lanka and portray controversies between traditional values and contemporary relationships.
Lanka has been working as an award-winning actor and costume designer since 1998. She was a juror and curator for fiction at the Sound & Image Challenge International Festival in 2018 and 2019 in Macau. In 2019 she received the ITEC scholarship to study a filmmaking certificate course at the Satyajit Ray Film and Television School in Kolkata. In 2021, she received a Chevening Scholarship for her Master's degree, which she completed with distinction in Directing Film and Television at Bournemouth University in the United Kingdom.
Currently, she is working as the main director of the documentary "She.” The project connects women peacebuilders from Sri Lanka, Myanmar, and Thailand. She is a member of the South Asian Cinema and VOD Network, a collaborative and interdisciplinary research project in the United Kingdom. Her debut feature film project, “The Hail,” was selected for a Film Independent-Global Media Makers in-person residency in 2022 in Los Angeles, USA.