South Asian Film Season 2024
Channel 4 presents a South Asian Film Season starting on Sunday 8th September 2024 and running through September, featuring eight films, which represent a cross-section of the best contemporary examples of South Asian cinema.
Curated by longstanding season consultant and Indian cinema expert, Nasreen Kabir, this year’s season includes the work of filmmakers from India, Pakistan, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka and spans drama, thriller, documentary and social realism, exploring themes of class, racial, political and gender divides.
The season airs on Channel 4, with all films available to stream after broadcast on www.channel4.com All films are Network Premieres.
JORAM
Early hours of Monday 9 September at 2.10am
Available on Channel 4 streaming post transmission
Director Devashish Makhija’s tense vendetta drama JORAM, starring award-winning Indian actor Manoj Bajpai as Dasru, a tribal villager forced to go on the run with Joram, his three-month-old baby, following the brutal murder of his wife. Mumbai cop Ratnakar leads a breathless pursuit of the desperate fugitive and his daughter from cityscape to village.
NETWORK PREMIERE
KAMLI
Early Hours of Tuesday 10 September at 1.45am
Available on Channel 4 streaming post transmission
KAMLI, a psychological drama set in a village in Pakistan, is the story of three women, young and beautiful Hina, her blind sister-in-law Sakina and Zeenat, an artist disenchanted with her marriage, who also struggles with alcoholism. Hina has been waiting eight years for her husband to return from working abroad. Living with the tyrannical Sakina, Hina dreams of remarriage, fearing her youth and beauty are fading. She meets Amaltaas, a wanderer, and falls in love with him. In this unusual film from Pakistan, director Sarmad Khoosat blurs the line between illusion and reality.
NETWORK PREMIERE
BHAGWAN BHAROSE
Early hours of Thursday 12 September: Time TBC
Available on Channel 4 streaming post transmission
Director Shiladitya Bora sets his first film, BHAGWAN BHAROSE, in a village in late 1980s India, and tells the challenging story of two impressionable young boys, Bhola and Shambhu, growing up in a small community. The religious shows on TV, science lessons in school and the boys’ obsession with tales of gods and demons, lead Bhola and Shambhu to a polarised view of the world – and what begins as a game ends in dark reality.
NETWORK PREMIERE
NAAM SHAHANA (A HOUSE NAMED SHAHANA)
Date and Time TBC
Available on Channel 4 streaming post transmission
Bangladeshi-born British writer, playwright, theatre director and London-based actress, Leesa Gazi focuses her film BARIR NAAM SHAHANA (A HOUSE NAMED SHAHANA) on the unpredictable life of Dipa, an independent Muslim woman who, against her wishes, is married off to a Bengali widower living in the UK. She finds, once she arrives in Britain, that she is expected to conform to an orthodox lifestyle. Accepting the marriage is against all her instincts, she returns to Bangladesh where ultimately she has to defy all social and family pressures.
NETWORK PREMIERE
THE WORLD IS FAMILY
Date and Time TBC
Available on Channel 4 streaming post transmission
Renowned documentary filmmaker, Anand Patwardhan grew up in a family that fought for India’s freedom alongside Mahatma Gandhi and other important political figures, but rarely spoke about it. Today, as majoritarians rewrite India’s history, what started as a home movie has become more precious than mere personal nostalgia. Patwardhan's VASUDHAIVA KUTUMBAKAM a Sanskrit phrase meaning “THE WORLD IS FAMILY” is an ancient universalist idea that competes with exclusivist notions of caste and religious othering.
NETWORK PREMIERE
SOMETHING LIKE AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY
Date and Time TBC
Available on Channel 4 streaming post transmission
SOMETHING LIKE AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY is set in Dhaka and follows a couple Farhan and Tithi who, after ten years of a childless marriage, decide to try for a baby using IVF. One night, when Farhan goes to his neighbours to complain about a noisy party, their world is unexpectantly turned upside down. Written and performed by real-life Bangladeshi couple, director Mostofa Sarwar Farooki and his wife, actress Nusrat Imrose Tisha.
NETWORK PREMIERE
KOTTUKKAALI (THE ADAMANT GIRL)
Date and Time TBC
Available on Channel 4 streaming post transmission
KOTTUKKAALI (THE ADAMANT GIRL) comes from award-winning Tamil director P S Vinoth Raj and tells the story of Meena, 21-year-old who falls in love with a young man from a lower caste. Enraged and ashamed by this, her family and the man to whom she is officially betrothed, believe the infatuation is the result of possession and take Meena by force to a distant village to undergo a shaman’s rituals, seeking to rid her of the forbidden love.
NETWORK PREMIERE
PARADISE
Date and Time TBC
Available on Channel 4 streaming post transmission
We conclude the season with celebrated Sri Lankan director Prasanna Vithanage’s 2003 film PARADISE. Made in three languages, Tamil, English and Hindi, the film offers a rollercoaster ride of emotions. Kesav and Amritha arrive for a romantic holiday in the green hills of Sri Lanka, hoping for a break from their hectic media life in the city. However, on the first night, Kesav’s laptop is stolen from the bungalow where they are staying – taking months of project work with it. Kesav is ready to blame anyone, with the collusion of the local police. The turn of events spin out of control and the couple find themselves in a nightmare.
NETWORK PREMIERE
