[Reader-list] Just another British, Indian, Muslim, Arab, Christian lesbian romantic comedy

[Rana Dasgupta]

"Just another British, Indian, Muslim, Arab, Christian lesbian romantic 
comedy"
Liz Hoggard
02.04.09

http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/standard/article-23670299-details/%22Just+another+British%2C+Indian%2C+Muslim%2C+Arab%2C+Christian+lesbian+romantic+comedy%22/article.do

Two young women are introduced at an expensive Mayfair apartment full of 
antiques and exquisite glassware. A housekeeper brings in mint tea and 
sweetmeats. Both have boyfriends (indeed Tala is busy preparing for her 
huge society wedding) but it's a romantic coup de foudre.

This scene from writer-director Shamim Sarif's new lesbian romantic 
comedy, which opens tomorrow, is extraordinary for many reasons. We've 
had gay love stories set in the capital before. But Shamim's film - 
billed as "just another British, Indian, Muslim, Arab, Christian lesbian 
romantic comedy" - is the first time anyone has written a 
cross-cultural, cross-religious romance between two women.

I Can't Think Straight is the love affair between Tala, a London-based 
Jordanian of Palestinian origin, and Leyla, a shy young British Asian 
woman. What's more, it closely mirrors Shamim's own life story.

Thirteen years ago, London-based Shamim, a British Indian of Muslim 
origin, met her female partner, Hanan Kattan, a Palestinian from Jordan. 
She was 26, Hanan was 33. and both were from wealthy families. Hanan had 
fallen in love with women before and had in fact broken off five 
engagements to men but it was a shock for Shamim. When they first got 
together, they faced strong opposition from their families. "In the 
Middle East it is extremely rare to be 'out' and an Indian Muslim 
background meant that I also had some resistance [to it]," says Shamim.

"I was the first woman that Shamim had been with, so her mother threw a 
fit and blamed me," recalls Hanan, laughing. "But I loved the way she 
had integrity from the beginning. When we got together, she said: 'I am 
telling my parents', after week one."

Today they are married with two young sons - Ethan, 10, and Luca, six. I 
meet them at the beautiful Chelsea mansion flat, full of art and 
antiques, where they live, opposite the Chelsea Physic Garden. A 
housekeeper brings us coffee and everywhere there are photos of the two 
boys - handsome, mischievous - who are half-siblings. "We both carried a 
child each, they have the same father," explains Shamim simply.

The couple met at a tea party - just like in the film - at Hanan's 
parents' house in Mayfair. Shamim was actually dating Hanan's best male 
friend at the time. "He wanted to marry Shamim but nothing had happened 
between them except a few dates. We're very good friends now and go on 
holiday together. He made a speech at our wedding. No hearts were 
broken, which is why I can tell it so lightly," says Hanan.

It took a while after their initial meeting to reveal how they felt 
about each other. "We both battled with our feelings along the way," 
Shamim says. "There was certainly a long period of denied attraction. It 
took Hanan a bit longer than me to be able to feel comfortable enough to 
come out to her family and friends, because I think she was very aware 
of her parents' standing in the Middle East, where everyone tends to 
know everyone. But what was wonderful was that certain people, including 
one of Hanan's sisters and my own sister, Anouchka, made it clear that 
if our parents or anyone else had an issue with us then they had an 
issue with them, too. That kind of support is invaluable."

Most films about lesbians are set in grinding poverty. I Can't Think 
Straight is glamorous and aspirational. Yes, it's a bit sentimental. But 
in many ways the couple are pioneers. They had their first child 10 
years ago when lesbian motherhood was more controversial. "My dad was 
quite practical about it," says Shamim. "He said: 'You're old enough to 
know what you want to do.' My mother had a harder time because she was 
more concerned with what people's perceptions would be. Since then she's 
come around and she's absolutely fine but it was a process of years."

They married at a civil wedding at Chelsea Town Hall in 2006, followed 
by a lunch for 40 friends and family. They talk lightly about the early 
prejudice they faced. "Being honest and open was much more important to 
us, particularly when we had children," says Shamim, "because we didn't 
want our children to grow up feeling the relationship between us was 
anything but right and correct, because we love each other and chose to 
be together. We took the resistance and aggravation in our stride, and 
found that when people know you they get over the abstract fear of the 
unknown."

And yet there have been casualties. Of Hanan's five sisters, three have 
disapproved of their relationship; one will still not speak to them. And 
when a Muslim Indian client of Shamim's father read his daughter was 
gay, he withdrew all his business from her father's company and 
threatened to take the rest of the community with him. "It's horrible to 
do that to a man in his seventies, to use your economic muscle to punish 
the father," says Shamim.

Ironic when they are such a success story. Today their life seems highly 
enviable. They live in one of London's most desirable addresses. Their 
office and the boys' school is literally down the street. Their 
housekeeper and Shamim's sister help out with childcare. Hanan sold her 
ethical beauty and haircare business before they moved into film 
production. They both come from high-achieving families. Shamim's father 
set up a life insurance company in London, while Hanan's Arab parents 
had businesses in Jordan before the war. "Her grandfather was a leading 
entrepreneur and philanthropist in Jordan and Palestine, so they were 
not destitute."

They make a striking couple: Shamim, with an urchin crop and killer 
cheekbones; Hanan, with a mop of wild curls. Shamim never expected to 
become a film director. Born in south London after her parents left 
South Africa in the early Sixties to escape apartheid, she studied 
English literature at London University, then took a Masters in English 
at Boston University. Her first novel, The World Unseen, is a Fifties 
love affair between two Indian South African women, which won the Betty 
Trask Award. She optioned one short story (about unrequited love) to a 
film company in Hollywood but, as she observes wryly: "They raised quite 
a big budget - $15 million - but wanted two sex scenes and a nude scene 
added. Quite a tall order in an unrequited love story."

So she and Hanan decided to start their own production company to make 
the screenplay of I Can't Think Straight. Shamim had been studying 
directing at London's Raindance Institute. But it was a "baptism of 
fire" to turn her first script into a £1 million movie. "Neither of us 
had really been on a film set before so the learning curve was off the 
chart."

The films stars the Indian-Polish actress Lisa Ray, who won rave reviews 
for Deepa Mehta's film Water. She is the character inspired by Hanan, 
while Shamim is played by the Asian American actress Sheetal Sheth. They 
would have loved to have cast British Arab and Asian actresses but 
everyone balked at the explicit lesbian love scene. Shamim also wanted 
to use Arab language songs over the scenes but ended up having to write 
them herself when she couldn't get permission.

And that wasn't the only headache. Their first equity investor let them 
down. The money never arrived, the shooting schedule was cut - and 
eventually he held on to the finished film. Shamim had to go to court to 
get it back. In the middle of the nightmare, they got the money to start 
shooting her second film, based on her novel The World Unseen. This time 
private equity was raised by a band of female executive producers 
including Lisa Tchenguiz-Imerman (sister of property developers Vincent 
and Robert Tchenguiz). "Lisa has been a close friend of mine for 20 
years and so supportive," says Hanan. They regained control of I Can't 
Think Straight and the two films will be released in the UK on the same 
day. "In Toronto we had them both playing in the same cinema," marvels 
Shamim. Critics have compared The World Unseen (a proper art film, which 
also stars Ray and Sheth) to Brokeback Mountain.

But it's I Can't Think Straight that will grab the headlines. Shamim is 
realistic that it may upset London's more traditional Muslim community. 
"I think the homosexuality will be difficult for them. The fact that 
it's a love story between two women is an issue for most Middle Eastern 
cultures."