Ancestral Hauntings: Short Film Programme
Director: Various
Run time: 60 mins | Recommended Certificate: 12A
Language: English, Urdu, Tamil with English subtitles | Year: 2025-26 | Country: UK
London Indian Film Festival is delighted to present a compelling programme of short films by exciting filmmakers of South Asian origin, exploring ancestry, heritage, and the lasting impact of colonialism. Examining race, prejudice, and lineage, the films explore how the spectres of colonialism linger through language, touch, and songs of resistance. A range of distinct stories reflect on how colonial legacies percolate through generations and haunt across distance.
Films in the programme:
The Curfew
Dir: Shehrezad Maher | 19 mins | English, Urdu with English subtitles
When Ayaan becomes a temporary caregiver for his grandmother, they find themselves adrift in the gulf of a language barrier. In the silence, spectres of a colonial past shift how he sees strangers and himself.
Haunted Heritage
Dir: Surina Narula | 15 mins | English
A woman moves into a mansion, only to find it is haunted by the ghost of an elderly matron, who forces her to confront her own prejudices. The film explores how inherited privilege and unexamined racism persist across cultures and how the ghosts we fight often mirror the ones we carry within.
Sugarcane, Burning
Dir: Tahsin Singh | 17 mins | English, Tamil with English subtitles
A young woman stands at the threshold of motherhood, suspended between what she has inherited and what she will pass on. Rooted in the historical migration of thousands of Indians to Southern Africa as indentured labourers in the nineteenth century, the film swims through the invisible weight of language, memory and home, as carried through generations.
The screening will be followed by a Q&A with the filmmakers
Supported by Filmistan
