What to watch this September? Channel 4 has two curated seasons full of International stories to explore

5 September 2024

SOUTH ASIAN FILM SEASON AND EAST AND SOUTH EAST ASIAN HERITAGE MONTH ON CHANNEL 4

This September Channel 4 streaming has two brilliantly curated seasons to enjoy:

 

SOUTH ASIAN FILM SEASON

 

From Sunday 8th September eight films that represent a cross-section of the best contemporary examples of South Asian cinema will be available to watch live and to stream on Channel 4 from Friday 13th September.

 

The South Asian Film Season will feature network premieres of:

 

• JORAM
• KAMLI
• BHAGWAN BHAROSE
• BARIR NAAM SHAHANA (A HOUSE NAMED SHAHANA)
• THE WORLD IS FAMILY (VASUDHAIVA KUTUMBAKAM)
• SOMETHING LIKE AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY
• KOTTUKKAALI (THE ADAMANT GIRL)
• PARADISE

 

Curated by longstanding season consultant and Indian cinema expert, Nasreen Kabir, this year’s South Asia Film Season includes the work of filmmakers from India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Sri Lanka and spans drama, thriller, documentary, and social realism, exploring themes relating to class, racial, political and gender divides.

 

JORAM

Joram is a tense vendetta drama that stars the 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.

 

KAMLI

The season continues with a psychological drama set in a village in Pakistan. Kamli 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.  

 

BHAGWAN BHAROSE

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.

 

BARIR NAAM SHAHANA (A HOUSE NAMED SHAHANA)

Bangladeshi-born British writer, playwright, filmmaker, 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. Against her wishes, she is married off to a Bengali widower living in the UK and finds, once she arrives in Britain, that she is expected to conform to an orthodox lifestyle.

 

THE WORLD IS FAMILY (VASUDHAIVA KUTUMBAKAM)

Renowned documentary filmmaker Anand Patwardhan explores the ancient universalist idea that competes with exclusivist notions of caste and religious offering in Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam, a Sanskrit phrase meaning ‘The World is Family.’

 

SOMETHING LIKE AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY

Set in Dhaka, Something Like an Autobiography follows Farhan and Tithi when they decide to try for a baby using IVF. The couple are played by real-life Bangladeshi husband and wife, director Mostofa Sarwar Farooki, and actress Nusrat Imrose Tisha.

 

KOTTUKKAALI (THE ADAMANT GIRL)

The seventh film in the South Asian cinema season comes from award-winning Tamil director P S Vinoth Raj. Kottukkaali (The Adamant Girl) tells the story of Meena, a 21-year-old who falls in love with a young man from a lower caste.

 

PARADISE

The season concludes with celebrated Sri Lankan director Prasanna Vithanage’s film Paradise. Made in three languages, Tamil, English, and Hindi, the film offers a rollercoaster ride of emotions as we see Kesav collide with the local police whilst on holiday with Amritha in Sri Lanka. Events spin out of control and the couple find themselves in a nightmare.

For more information please click here.

EAST AND SOUTH EAST ASIAN HERITAGE MONTH ON CHANNEL 4 AND FILM4

Running throughout September Channel 4 and Film4 are also curating a collection of films and TV series to celebrate East and South East Asian Heritage Month.

Films featured include:

• Anime films Your Name and Weathering with You
• Thriller First Love set in Japan
• Oscar-winning dark comic thriller Parasite
• Drive My Car, the Oscar-winning drama about love and loss
• Hong Kong fact-based thriller Caught in Time
• 2022 South Korean action thriller Special Delivery
• The Farewell, a comedy-drama which stars Awkwafina
• Korean 2020 film The Swordsman

 

Plus TV shows such as:

• Critically acclaimed all-star sci-fi drama Humans
• Gok Cooks Chinese where the style guru showcases his other great passion: Chinese cooking
• Documentary Secrets of the Terracotta Warriors which showcases exclusive access to the recent discoveries of the Terracotta Army
• Our Guy in Japan and Our Guy in China which sees Guy Martin go on off-beat journeys around the two countries
• Female-led drama anthology episode starring Gemma Chan I Am…Hannah
• Comedy drama Gap Year
• Myanmar: The Forgotten Revolution Dispatches which is a look at the world's forgotten civil war as thousands fight against a military coup
• Britain’s Forgotten Wars with Tony Robinson
• Japan’s Tsunami: Caught on Camera which features footage and eye witness accounts of the tsunami that devastated Japan in March 2011.

 

The collection of films and TV series are all available to stream now on Channel 4.