Yasmin

The above title was suggested as a suitable alternative name for the film by one of the crew who was I was chatting to after its screening at the Edinburgh International Film Festival. David Blunkett's attempts to flout or re-write the law have produced widespread condemnation from civil liberties groups and lawyers - but one of the minority groups most affected is British Muslims.

In this warm, light-hearted comedy, set in a British Muslim community immediately around and immediately after 9/11, we see the horror of what members of that community were faced with as a result of the social, institutional and (shamefully) police and legal disregard for their civil liberties. In explaining the extensive research behind the film, Director Kenneth Glenaan says the examples used (innocent families being awoken by police 'terror' squads, thrusting guns in their faces, detaining them indefinitely etc) were typical of many actual cases, as were the scenes of discrimination and abuse in the workplace and in the street.

In our story, a modern, working Pakistani woman, Yasmin, has a traditional (if lay-about) husband who is falsely imprisoned as a terrorist suspect. It turns out that the rather simple chap, isolated by his poor English, had been making long phone calls to his brother back home – who it so happens was a teacher at a school that had received funds from the Kashmir Liberation Front (which has connections with terrorism). Yasmin was about to divorce him, but the disingenuousness of the authorities eventually leads her to take his side as she realises injustices are being perpetrated against him.

Other members of the family cover a range of attitudes, from the newly-recruited activist son distributing flyers (when not selling hash or working at the local mosque), the father who keeps trying to introduce a note of common sense, to the youths who find their new-found I(if fictitious) aura of ‘potentially dangerous freedom fighters' helps them attract local white girls. We see the way a decent white person woos a Pakistani who is not a practicing Muslim, how she has adapted to western values, yet we also see the bigoted look of shock on his face when she suggests he accompany her to the mosque one day. We see police tactics from the point of view of Muslims who have nothing to hide, the repugnance of those police tactics, yet when we examine them honestly we realise they are quite what we might expect – and we wouldn't have found them repugnant unless we saw them from the receiving end.

But Yasmin is not a diatribe or an ode to the miseries of a disenfranchised group. It is a film about the many positive experiences that everyone can relate to within a small British Muslim community. It takes away much of the mystique and makes everyday Islam a little less arcane to the western newcomer. It uncovers more similarities than differences. It is a film that crosses borders, that lets us enter other peoples' hearts (in a similar way that a Full Monty, by the same writer, did), but it also leaves us with very serious questions to consider.

A few of things I pondered during this film:

In Britain, most white people cannot distinguish (by looking) between a Pakistani, an Iraqi, a Palestinian, a Syrian, etc. Neither can we distinguish the accents (a point also made by Control Room filmmaker Jehane Noujaim - the 'Iraqis' toppling the statue of Saddam Hussein did not appear to be Iraqis).

When we hold our western democracy up as an example for other countries to emulate, it is shameful that our government should be guilty of implementing such unworthy measures as those experienced by British Muslims.

The attitude of the British government has pushed Muslims together, of whatever background: if faced with a choice of two evils, people are more likely to be understanding of family and those of the same or similar culture. The attitude of our government in clamping down unjustly and indiscriminately on Brtitish Muslims in itself helps to foster terrorism, and gives terrorist recruiters more ammunition (just as Bush's actions in Iraq, in immediate practical terms, increased the threat of terrorism).

Not all people in a Muslim community are Muslims! Some haven't been to a mosque for years.

The lies told to the British public over Iraq cause untold suffering to innocent British Muslims. Not only indirectly through prejudices introduced through the system, but they are blamed in a totalitarian way simply because they are Muslim. The real culprits, those with massive oil interests (primarily Osama bin Laden and co and George Bush & co), and those that fund and keep terrorism covert (primarily Saudi Arabia and the CIA) are given a light dusting by the public and the authorities - largely because they are untouchable (and Saudi Arabia's foreign investments are so vast that upsetting them will upset the Western economy).

In the Muslim / Arab's mind, all the Middle East conflicts centre around Palestine. This has been said again and again but is ignored by Westerners. Right Wing USA has no real intention of 'solving' the Israeli/Palestinian conflict except as part of U.S. expansionism, as outlined by the NeoConservatives' blueprints that guide U.S. foreign policy. Anyone wanting a fuller understanding of the East-West Islam-Christianity relations and conflicts need only study and comprehend the Israel-Palestine situation.

Yasmin uses a number of stereotypes, all pushed together into one family. This is its strength and its weakness - to break new ground, especially using the medium of light comedy (which reaches people persuasively without polemic), stereotypes help to focus public awareness. The weakness is that many Muslims may feel patronised by the simplisticness. Many stereotypes are also not covered - the well-educated, middle class British Muslim, for instance. But some of these themes are outwith the scope of the film. Reactions to the movie at the Edinburgh International Film Festival screenings, both ecstatic and critical, show there is still much to be done. But this film opens at least a window of understanding for the white, non-Muslim community on the subject of oppression of British Muslims since 9/11 - a very small window perhaps, but perhaps the first one. At the time of writing, the film has distribution rights secured all over Europe - except, of course, the island where Mr Blunkett happens to live.

Yasmin Husseini lives with her father, brother, uncle and her "husband" – her marriage to immigrant Faysal being an arrangement between families as opposed to a relationship. Divorce is on the cards as she is very together and British-born while his poor English and "uncivilised" ways grate on her. Living a traditional Muslim life at home for her father but living like a "Westerner" at work, Yasmin is forced to take sides when a news flash comes onto the TV on the afternoon of September 11th 2001. Treated differently by everyone, Yasmin tries to get on the best she can but soon learns about the true nature of new UK terror laws when it turns out that Faysal who has a brother back home who teaches at a school funded by the KLF.

Described by another reviewer on this site in his name-dropping but useful review on this site as a "light-hearted comedy", this film was clearly not marketed well if that's what people thought it was going to be – rather it is a solid drama that looks at the impact of 11/9/01 on the British Muslim community – many of the younger generation, like Yasmin, have much more in community with western values than with those preached by Bin Laden. On the face of it the film could have been a very PC affair with a load of pandering; however, aside from loads of "white authority" stereotypes the film is pretty balanced and interesting look at the plight of Yasmin. The story is interesting enough and lots of issues are touched on – interracial relationships, fear, old world versus western values, disaffected youth and so on; mostly it all works although the nature of the beast means that Yasmin's situation is quite extreme because so many situations are rolled into the experience of the Husseini family.

The cast is pretty good though and it is mainly their work that keeps it worked and stops their characters just being big clichés. Panjabi is a good actress and her Yasmin is well crafted with conflicting loyalties and desires, making her an interesting character and a good performance. Ahmed's Nas is a good performance, very natural, and it is not his fault that he has to carry the extreme experience of disaffected youth being drawn into terrorism. Jackson is lumbered with a poor character – merely a combination of all the mistrust that we are being old that "all white people" have towards Islam; he tries his best and is natural at the start but once 9/11 occur he is clumsy and poorly written when viewed next to Yasmin.

Overall this is a good film that does a good job of summarising the Muslim experience since they became public enemy #1. Being Northern Irish, I know how it feels (and also know how it feels to suffer under the Prevention of Terrorism Act, as was) and I am not too sympathetic with Muslims groups who play the race card in every discussion on this subject, so I liked that the film didn't do that. The title role is well performed and the film does a good job of pulling a lot together without making it one big clichéd PC mess.

The film "Yasmin" by Kenny Glenaan is about a young Pakistani woman who has to rearrange her world past 9/11. Yasmin, who lives in the Muslim area of a north English town, has a double life. In the Muslim society she is the daughter of the mosque's custodian and a good Muslim wife, but in her job in the "white, English world" she is an atheist and trendy single woman. The truth lies somewhere in between, which she has to face when 9/11 hits her life and people start treating her with mistrust and suspicion.

The conflicted Yasmin has a conservative, religious father. Her brother is also religious but he can easily be influenced and becomes an extremist. In contrast to them there is John, her English friend, who is obviously in love with Yasmin but is finally overtaxed by Yasmin's problems. One of those is Faysal, her bogus husband, who is completely misplaced in England because he is incapable of the language and isolated.

Kenny Glenaan has created a movie which shows a woman finding her identity in the middle of a religious conflict. He shows how prejudices can destroy lives, and how they can affect everyone. But he also explains how extreme situations can make you think about yourself and find your place in the world.

I really liked "Yasmin" because it is about real people, issues and emotions. You can feel that there are real stories behind this fiction.

One could say this movie is too simple, no work of art. But I guess it is in fact this simplicity which makes this film that good, because it is not artificial- it is simply a captivating story. That's enough.

I recommend this film to everyone who is interested in real issues and people, in the problems of our time and the impact they have on us. Everyone fascinated by the complex relations between people will be captivated by this study of microcosm of a conflicted family.

I initially thought 'Yasmin' was going to be just another preachy 9/11 aftermath flick but I was pleasantly surprised. It tells the story of a young Muslim British who leads a double life. There is a Yasmin who wears a burka when she's out in her neighbourhood, who cooks for her father and brother and who is only legally married to a potential immigrant. Then there's a Yasmin who wears modern Western clothes, hangs out at the pub with a colleague she fancies and doesn't mind an occasional drink. She knows that her family and neighbours won't accept this side of her and she knows that her colleagues won't accept the Muslim side of her. However, after 9/11 Yasmin is forced with an identity crisis and it is here that she discovers her strength and the beauty of who she really is. 'Yasmin' never goes over the top which in a way is its strength but also its weakness.

The execution, for one, is too simplistic. The cinematography, the lack of score, the washed out colour look, the sound design, doesn't occasionally feels too dull. There are also some cultural clichés that 'Yasmin' seems to not have been able to escape.

Archie Punjabi is marvelous in the title role. It's a tour du force performance which she plays very subtly unlike the hyped Hollywood performances that beg for an Oscar. The rest of the cast do a decent job, especially the actor playing her husband.

'Yasmin' attempts to tell a different side of the aftermath of the 9/11. Even though it's not shown for more than a few minutes it's still an intriguing perspective and an important story.

It is a "story" built on top of a "topic". The story is about the consequences of the September 11 attacks on the daily life of a young British Muslim woman. The topic is Islam's shift towards conservatism (and fundamentalism) that many people blame on The West's "fight against terrorism".

As such the story is necessarily incomplete, stereotypical, and unreal. But, as such, it does a pretty good job of making me think of what could be real --- the fear, the hate, the horror of law abuse, the consequences.

The movie is also well balanced: smiles and tears are spared wisely. I just did not like the end.