Diaspora identity crux of new-age British films

KOLKATA: They’re not ABCDs. They’re not British Born Confused Desis, either. They bend it like Beckham, though they’re not celebrated like Gurinder Chadha or Mira Nair.
They’re Asif Kapadia, Narain Jashanmal, Shakeela Mann, Sangeeta Datta, the new breed of filmmakers whose ventures comprise the Diverse UK film festival that started at Nandan on Tuesday.
Curated by Sangeeta Datta, Shyam Benegal’s biographer, the creativity of Indian and Bangladeshi directors traces how the diaspora identity is carved out in British films of the new millennium.
How so? “These Brit-Asians explore stories from their communities even as they interface with the mainstream culture. Some, like My Beautiful Laundrette, look back at the 70s and 80s when Asians tried to fit in against pressures of racist intolerance. Some, like East Is East, examine changing values with self-reflective humour.
My Son the Fanatic turn a serious eye at the spread of religious fundamentalism. And Quiet Desperation looks at the underbelly of the migrant’s success,� explains Datta, whose In Search of Durga focuses on UK Bengalis.