Projects in genres: Asian

Synopsis

Casim is a second generation Pakistani from Glasgow. Working as a DJ in Glasgow's coolest venues, he dreams of buying his own club. His parents Tariq and Sadia are devout Muslims and plan for him to marry his beautiful cousin Jasmine - who is soon to arrive in the UK. His proud father spends all his spare time supervising the building of an extension to the family home where the couple are to live. Casim's parents then arrange for his older sister Rukhsana to marry Amar, a promising young scientist from a good family. Life for Casim and his family is ticking along nicely. Until he meets Roisin.   A music teacher at his sister Tahara's school, Roisin Hanlon is sparky and intelligent. She and Casim soon fall deeply in love. But Casim knows all too well that, even if he wasn't due to marry, his parents would never accept a 'goree' - a white girl. And as a Catholic, Roisin finds that her own community aren't very supportive either. Then Casim and Roisin are discovered, and the repercussions of the scandal reach far and wide. When Casim's family find that their peaceful and ordered life is threatened, they decide to take action - bringing matters to a dramatic conclusion.  

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Aisha is a young, Muslim-American woman studying abroad in London. She is dating the roguish Rashid but lives with her devout, hijab wearing cousin Fatimah. When her two worlds collide, Aisha is forced to reconcile her faith with her desires.

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Shashi is in love with a white boy in Scotland, so her parents pack her off to India so that her Grandparents can arrange a more suitable match.   But none of them have reckoned with Grandfather.

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The basic plot  tells the story of a twenty one-year-old university student, Manisha, and her English boyfriend, Paul. What follows is a typical and very moving story of the clash between her modern way of life and her parents preconceptions of how she must live.

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Brick Lane is a British-Asian, Bollywood influenced comedy about the quest of two teenage boys out to impress the beautiful Nabeela at a local Bhangra Party - even at the expense of the notorious Bucksman. This short film explores the lives of Asian youth living in contemporary London.

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When a wedding comes to a small town in the Indian countryside, it's a good opportunity for Mrs Bakshi to find eligible mates for her four daughters, but the smart and headstrong Lalita is determined to marry for love. Sparks fly when she meets the handsome American Will Darcy, but is it love or hate?   Gurinder Chadha directs this Bollywood-style re-telling of Jane Austen's classic tale of marriage and manners, transplanted to modern-day India, England and America, and complete with lavish musical spectacle.

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A Coen-esque black comedy set amidst the underbelly of the mini-cab demi-world in London.  We follow a group of four drivers who inhabit a gritty cab office as they attempt to deal with a decline in business. We have Remi, who has been kicked out of his home by his wife and sleeps in his car boot at night. Danny, who prefers to engage his fists to settle disputes rather than his brainpower. Cola, who is tanked up with enough medication to kill a horse and Abdul, who sells anything from pirate DVD's to fetish wear from the back of his car. The minicab owner (Nikos) spends his time scuttling around in his dressing gown and slippers, fermenting his 'New Deal' strategy to turn around his economic fortune. Following an unscheduled visit from the local loan shark, he gives his four drivers an ultimatum. The two who bring the most money back to the office, keep their jobs. The other two can join the unemployment scrap-heap. Simple. This sets off a chain of events that stretches their characters, and ensures that the office will never be the same again.

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The tale of Josh, a man at the end of his tether for whom wine, song and women no longer hold any pleasure. He books a call girl when spurned at a bar. Tara the call girl is not happy about being called out during daylight hours. However a job's a job. These two damaged individuals come together like a jigsaw puzzle forming a picture of the intricacies of their lives. They find in each other a difference and similarity that brings to them both a moment of hope.

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Ismail and Muhuit are standing as independent candidates in the local council election, fighting on the issue of providing detox centres for the crack and heroin addicts on the streets in and around Brick Lane, Banglatown, London E1.   In and around these same streets, tour guides peddle gory tales of Jack the Ripper and trivia about the local gangsters, the Krays. Tourists cling to this tabloid version of remembrance of things past.  Is everyone oblivious to the Bengali community and their history?   Delwas has lived in E1 for more than 15 years and takes us on an alternative tour of the area. We find it is rich in history, art and politics and discover the only museum of immigration in Europe.

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A poetic and compelling 16mm film shot in London, Karachi and Lahore which encompasses five stories relating to the times of day for Muslim prayer. The work explores overlaps between time, memory and location. Connecting different places and people through images and sounds, Eating Grass contains documentary footage accompanied by a voiceover in both Urdu and English. The textures of individual voices continually slip from one language to another, creating and repeating rhythms. Meaning is not only conveyed by what is said but also by building tonal rhythmical cadences, similar musical structures to those found in jazz or Indian classical music.

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Mother/Country is a stunningly filmed, intimate experimental documentary. The film charts the director's return journey back to her Mother's house 20 years after the Iranian Revolution. Through the development of fiction with actors, the filmmaker attempts to unravel the events of the past and to find resolution.

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Irrfan Khan (The Warrior) and Koel Purie (Everybody Says I'm Fine) lead this surreal rites of passage encounter between a dysfunctional, coke-snorting fashion model and an ultra-focussed, strong-silent stranger who are thrown together by chance. Set in the magnificent wilderness moon-scape of Ladakh, India, the road journey and the strange encounters that follow provide a dramatic backdrop for the relationship that develops. Both are outsiders, both are lonely, both crave the human contact that their roles in society deny them. Tentatively they search each other out in a film that is poised between elusiveness and engagement, suspicion and tenderness - at once hilarious and sinister, bizarre and moving, psychedelic and intensely real, Road to Ladakh is an original story scripted, edited and produced by director Ashvin Kumar.