Short films on racism

By Hamza Butt & Tristen Smith

• The film Shaheed is similar to what I am doing. In this film a Palestinian teenage boy is getting ready to go to a synagogue memorial day. When he reaches there he puts his hand in his bag, a police officer standing on the side sees this he goes over and tackles the boy to the ground. The belongings in the bag fall out and they are revealed to be flowers and a picture of him and his friend who had died.

• How this film relates to mine is because I am also trying to portray the same message that just because you dress a certain way or I you are a Muslim it doesn’t automatically make you a terrorist or extremist.

• Whist researching for short films I watched this film watching this film gave me a bit of a idea and inspiration for my own film. As you can see this film follows the same type of conventions and ideas that I am also trying to put through in my own film. The themes are also quite similar to the themes which my film is based around as the most important themes of this film are religion, race and terrorism.

• The main character who's name is Shaheed is a lot similar to my character Zain. The reason why I believe that Shaheed is a lot similar to Zain is because they are both in the same situation as Zain is called a terrorist and a radical extremist because of his colour and his religion. The same applies to Shaheed, where at the end of the film he is tackled down by the police officer because of the way he looks.

9/11 Mira Nair• This film is about a man called Salman who goes missing straight after the 9/11

attacks. He is wanted by the police in connection with the attacks, he is a American citizen however he was born in Pakistan. After a newspaper release a report saying Salman was involved in the attacks his family is boycotted from within the community. 6 months later whilst his family are sleeping his father receives a call from the FBI detectives telling them that Salman remains have been identified and that he was one of the people who were at the scene saving people.

• How my film is similar to this short film is because again it follows same ideology's and conventions what my film is following which are that if you are a Muslim you are a terrorist. For example in the end scene when his mother says that if your name was David or Jesus they would never have jumped to conclusions they would have just called you a hero. However because he was a Muslim they had to investigate and then get to their own conclusions.

• The characters in my film to some extent relate to the characters in this short film as they are all boycotted for something that they have not done, something that has been committed by a minority.