We interviewed Sonita Gale, director of the powerful Hostile, presented in official selection at the 2022 Melbourne Documentary Film Festival, which we are covering as official media partner.
As proud Official media partner of the 2022 Melbourne Documentary Film Festival, we are offering you a series of interviews with the filmmakers in competition at this year’s MDFF, running in person on July 21-31 and online on July 1-31.
Hostile is an award-winning feature-length documentary written, produced and directed by BAFTA-longlisted filmmaker Sonita Gale. It focuses on the UK’s complicated relationship with its migrant communities. Told through the stories of four participants from Black and Asian backgrounds, the film reveals the impact of the evolving ‘hostile environment’ – a term used by the UK government in 2012 to illustrate the atmosphere they wanted to create for migrants, with the intention of provoking them to leave of their own accord.
The film explores how the lives of international students, members of the Windrush generation and ‘Highly-Skilled Migrants’ have been affected. After decades of hostile immigration policies, Britain has reached a crisis point. With Brexit, the Points Based Immigration System and the Nationality and Borders Bill taking effect, the film asks: once the ‘hostile environment’ has targeted all migrants, who will it extend to next?
We were delighted to chat with director Sonita Gale, about the making of this powerful film.
“We hope that Hostile can really help to open up vital conversations around migrants rights and how we can inspire positive change”
Tell us about what prompted you to work on Hostile?
Sonita Gale: My parents were the primary inspiration for the film. They migrated to the UK in the 1950s, almost a decade after their lives had changed dramatically due to the partition of India and Pakistan. My mum was a refugee, torn away from her community. She walked for 16 consecutive days, 180 kilometres from Lahore to Punjab.
Their story of migration, and of eventually making a home in England, became the seed of an idea to make a film about the experiences of migrant communities.
The specific event that I would say marked the starting point on this journey is after the pandemic started and lockdown began, and I started to see the rising number of people who were unable to get their basic needs of food and shelter met.
This made me think of my childhood growing up in the Midlands with Sikh parents, and the support network we had amongst our mixed community in Wolverhampton. My father’s cornershop was the hub of this community.
When I began filming, my focus turned to the very communities I grew up with: Sikhs, Hindus, Muslims, Black and White working-class communities. The more I filmed, the more I learned about the Hostile Environment
From there, the story continued to develop. Meeting my participants and filming their unravelling narrative led me on a personal journey of discovery, one which linked my family’s history to the larger story of British identity, and the extent to which migrant communities, such as the one I grew up in, were essential to the fabric of this country.
As a filmmaker, the compelling personal nature of the story, combined with the fact that there were so many inconsistencies in our society and contradictions in our current political system, made me want to embark on my directing debut.
How did you pick the characters who share their stories in the film? What were you looking for when selecting them?
Sonita Gale: These stories were found due to a mix of chance and thorough research. It started when I was reaching out to community organisers when the first lockdown struck.
I chose each particular participant because their stories were particularly engaging, and reflected my journey in learning more about the hostile environment, which is the same journey I wanted to take audiences on.
Daksha: I found Daksha Varsani in an article in the Kilburn times That led me to West London, which has a large multicultural heritage. Daksha and her husband Paresh set up a Community Response kitchen, at first to feed NHS staff who did not have access to meals during the early days of the pandemic. Eventually, their operation expanded to include the wider community. She was also helping international students.
International students: When Daksha led me to a group of international students, this point was further emphasised. Due to their inability to work, they were unable to pay tuition fees, for their accommodation or even food. They had no support from the universities that accepted them into their programmes, or the government who – through the No Recourse to Public Funds Policy that applies to non-permanent residents – does not consider them worthy of public funding support.
The students’ story made me consider what a possible future for them would be like if they were able to stay in the UK. That is when I found Farrukh, whose story plays out as the life of someone who came to the UK as a student, looking at it from the perspective of a decade later.
Farrukh: I encountered Farrukh Sair via an article in The Independent, an IT consultant working for the NHS who was left deep in debt (around £80,000) after the Home Office revoked his right to work.
Anthony : Because of Farrukh and the issues around “So called Highly Skilled Migrants” I wanted to learn more about the history of this Hostility. I was familiar with the Windrush Scandal which broke in 2017. As I delved deeper into this I found Anthony who’s TV movie Sitting In Limbo I had watched, which was released in June 2020. We interviewed him for the first time a few weeks later.
Hostile environment policies: This led me to explore the issue of the government’s Hostile Environment policies more broadly
I’m thankful to them for sharing their stories so we can give audiences a look at the Hostile Environment beyond the headlines, to see how it impacts people on a personal level.
As you were working on the film, did you become more or less hopeful about the situation of migrants in UK’s society?
Sonita Gale: The answer to this question is complicated. I learned a lot during the process of making this film, and one of the things that were shocking to me is that, yes, the situation was indeed much worse than I had thought.
My parents’ generation definitely received pushback from some sections of society that did not accept them, and couldn’t accept them as British. However, at least to some degree the state was accommodating, because they needed them as workers following World War 2.
However now, they face attacks on all sides – from political parties, the press and a large proportion of the population that feels some form of resentment which leads to racism.
Since making the film, a number of bills that gives the government enhanced powers over the way they are able to limit the freedoms of migrants and UK citizens have passed. These include the Nationality and Borders Act, the Police, Crimes Sentencing and Courts Act and the Elections Act. Looking ahead, a new proposal in the form of the Bill of Rights Bill, if passed, would allow the government to sidestep rulings from European Court of Human Rights rulings.
However, I feel hopeful because I truly believe change is possible. That is why I end the film on a positive note. During filming in 2020 we witnessed a number of protest movements that were sustained and significant in scale, and showed that people were not apathetic to things that were going on around them. These included: Black Lives Matter protests, NHS Fair Pay Protests, Anti-Deportation Protests, Kill the Bill protests (against the Police, Crimes, Sentencing and Courts Bill, Extinction Rebellion protests and the organisation Stand Up To Racicm’s Anti-Eviction Protests.
And these continue today. Recently I was at a Kill the Bill / The Nationality and Borders Bill protest. Social media has sparked conversations, raised awareness of protestors – enabled people to get involved and take to the streets.
The push back we are seeing from all corners of society with regards to the Rwanda deportation scheme shows that the tide changing and people are waking up to the injustice that has been going on all around them.
What’s great is seeing different organisations coming together and uniting.
The message at the end of the film, with the release of Lakhvir Singh and Sumit Sehdev’s release in Glasgow, and the support they received, brings the story back to the idea of community which inspired this film to begin with through my parents.
The statements from Nitin Sawhney and Zarah Sultana also speak to the idea that activism works. We’ve seen over the last couple of years that so many people came together in times of need – whether that was through protesting or through supporting the local community.
As participant Zana Khan says “we are a country that is inclusive, not exclusive”. I hope this film makes audiences appreciate this, and inspires them to work together towards a kinder and more inclusive society.
Audiences need to feel that there is hope in order to be inspired.
Tell us about the feedback you received after screening the film at many festivals? And what type of effect does it have on the audience?
Sonita Gale: The response has been very positive. The film premiered at Raindance Festival 2021 in the ‘Homegrown’ category, and soon after it was longlisted for a 2022 BAFTA for Outstanding Debut By A British Writer, Director Or Producer, as well as three 2021 British Independent Film Awards – Best Documentary, Best Debut Director and the Raindance Discovery Award.
It has since been an Official Selection at the Cambridge Film Festival 2021 and London Migration Film Festival 2021, and Winner of Best Documentary Feature at the South London Film Festival 2021. It recently played in competition at the Manchester Film Festival, and screened at ZagrebDox 2022 and will soon play at the Melbourne Documentary Film Festival and Roxbury International Film Festival.
A Q&A tour for the film which is taking place in cinemas across the UK as well as other community venues began on January 21st and is still going strong.
We have had some fantastic hosts (like UK film critic Jason Solomons and director Ursula Macfarlane), and high profile speakers like human rights activist Bella Sankey, Yasmine Ahmed (UK Director of Human Rights Watch), author Maya Goodfellow, and more, who have enthusiastically endorsed the film.
Meanwhile, our Q&As have provoked some really insightful responses and debates from the audience and we hope that Hostile can really help to open up vital conversations around migrants rights and how we can inspire positive change. Individuals in the audience have been very open in sharing their personal experiences living under the Hostile Environment. Since the film’s release I have been hearing from people all around the UK about the impact it has on our communities.
Critics have reviewed Hostile in The Guardian (Peter Bradshaw), The New European, Gal-Dem, Timeout, Morning Star and The Upcoming to name a few.
On March 15th I was invited to screen Hostile at the BFI as part of ‘The Camera is Ours’ – a series of films celebrating pioneering female documentary makers from the 1930s til now. The event was hosted by Niting Sawhney, who has described the film as “An important and revealing film with critical questions and revelations about UK society in the 21st Century.”
Recently, the film played in front of lawmakers in the UK’s Parliament where the film was well received and inspired some critical debate, and we are developing plans to screen the film at the UN in Geneva later this year.
In general, do you think films and documentaries have the power and potential to change things? And minds?
Sonita Gale: Film is such a visceral medium, and one that is the easiest to get across to a wide audience, which is what makes it the ideal to inform a large number of people to question the way things work now, and inspire them to enact change.
Something I have seen during the making and release of Hostile is how film has the ability to connect different communities, organisations and demographics.
Immigration is also such a multi-faceted and complex issue and by allowing me to use different mediums to capture as many of these nuances as possible all in one place, using contemporary and historical perspectives.
I don’t see myself personally as an activist or a campaigner. I see myself as a storyteller, and someone who believes that change is possible. The way I am able to get this story across is via the medium of film.
All artistic mediums have the power to influence the conversation in their own way. But with documentary filmmaking in particular, there is this expectation of getting to an objective truth, and I feel a responsibility in getting the message right.
About the director
Sonita Gale is a British Asian writer, producer and director. Elevating the stories of migrants and marginalised communities is at the forefront of her work.
Sonita’s debut feature documentary as director, Hostile, is an award-winning and BAFTA and BIFA-longlisted film exposing the ‘hostile environment’ for migrants living in the UK. Hostile has screened across the country at Picturehouse and independent cinemas, and has been selected for a number of international film festivals, including the UK Asian Film Festival, Melbourne Documentary Film Festival, Budapest Movie awards and Manchester Film Festival, ZagrebDox and many more. In 2021, the film debuted at Raindance Film Festival and was an official selection of Cambridge Film Festival, London Migration Film Festival, and the South London Film Festival, where it won the award for Best Documentary Feature.
Learn more about Hostile on Instagram or Twitter. Tickets available for upcoming screenings and Q&As at www.hostiledocumentary.com/tickets.
