THIS is one artist who definitely wears his heart on his sleeve and is proud of doing so.

His short film, The Long Goodbye was in Oscar contention at the time of going to press.

Despite dropping on Youtube in April 2020 and being sponsored by file sharing site, We Transfer, on its artist creative platform, WePresent, the explosive and powerful 11-minute film made it through the early rounds of Academy voting to the final six in the live action short category.

In the autumn last year, its screening at pretigious short film festivals in the United States tied to the Academy and awards therein meant it qualified.

Conceived with fast upcoming British director Aneil Karia, the duo said they made the 11-minute film from the heart and egged each other on to make it as hard-hitting as they could. “It came from a natural place,” Karia said. The creative pair admitted this in December 2021 at an exclusive and intimate London hotel screening, which Eastern Eye (this publication’s sister title) attended.

Mark Kermode, BBC film critic and possibly the most famous film reviewer in the UK today, is a fan of the film and he conducted a short Q & A with the pair post the screening at the W Hotel.

The film depicts a dystopian nightmare scenario and the change in tone is abrupt as it is brilliant. One moment it’s a familiar Asian family scene – cousins bickering, unhappy mom and pop, laughter and gaiety among the young women who have gathered ahead of a family wedding, and Ahmed’s character trying to entertain his young cousin, shift things around the house, and be as helpful as he can…when masked men enter his street and begin to round up Asian men from their homes – he gets bundled