TV programmes
1. The Ark
TX:30/03/2015 BBC 1 Dur: 88’00”
Production Company: Red Planet Pictures
No additional information supplied.
2. Baz The Lost Muslim Part 2
TX: 15/12/2015 RTE2 Dur: 44’00”
Production Company: Brown Bread Films ltd
Hi,
My name is Baz Ashmawy. I'm the executive producer and presenter of the two part Documentary "Baz The Lost Muslim".
The Documentary Went out in December on RTE2 here in Ireland but I understand it is eligible for this UK award because it has a terrestrial footprint in Northern Ireland and a digital one in the UK. I have a certain following in the UK due to a SKY1 show that I also produce and present "50 Ways To Kill Your Mammy"
Our Doc 'Baz The Lost Muslim' was hugely successful and is even shown in schools now to give children a better understanding of islam and the people who follow it. It follows my journey back to rediscover the religion of my father and his fathers and also the misunderstanding with and reasons behind radicalisation.
It comes in two parts. Both different in tone and content but important to the overall narrative. thank you for time and consideration,
Baz Ashmawy
3. My Son the Jihadi
TX: 22/10/2015 Channel 4 Dur: 48'00"
Production Company: True Vision Productions
How do Islamist extremists recruit your children? This is a question Sally Evans, a white, British mother from High Wycombe never imagined she’d have to consider. But since her 21-year-old son Thomas disappeared to fight jihad in Somalia, it’s ruled her life. Filmed over a year, we see from the inside what it’s like being the mother of a terrorist. With the help of de-radicalisation expert Mike Jervis, Sally tries to unpick how Thomas was recruited and attempts to persuade him home during their intermittent phone calls. But as time goes on we see Sally fighting an emotional battle between the boy she remembers and the man he’s become. Talking with Thomas’ child bride on the phone, Sally is confronted with reality. In June 2015 Sally receives the phone call she’s been dreading. Thomas has been killed, and revelations in the wake of his death expose a shocking truth. Please visit the True Vision webpage for this film, which has newspaper reviews, television interviews and other articles for you to peruse: http://truevisiontv.com/films/details/283/my-son-the-jihadi
4. Songs of Praise
TX: 16/08/2015 BBC One Dur: 30’00”
Production Company: BBC Religion and Ethics
Songs of Praise, BBC One, August 16, 2015
The Songs of Praise broadcast on 16th August 2015 was the most controversial in the 54 year old programme’s history.
It explored the refugee crisis in Calais, at the peak of the international debate about what should happen to the three thousand people living in the makeshift camp known as ‘The Jungle’.
The programme makers found themselves at the centre of a media storm that began even before transmission. Presenter Sally Magnusson had to carry out filming with the press in tow, making front- page news.
The Sun led the way with the one word headline `Hymnigrants’ and The Daily Express carried the splash headline `Songs of Praise EXPOSED. This is how the BBC is spending YOUR CASH’.
In response, the Archbishop of Canterbury, novelist JK Rowling and others immediately tweeted their support of Songs of Praise.
In the programme, Sally Magnusson seeks out the temporary church built by and for Eritrean and Ethiopian refugees in the camp. An Ethiopian theology student who has adopted the role of priest explains: “We love this church more than ourselves.”
Sally also meets a group of Christians from Kent who offer aid despite fierce opposition back home and talks to French Christian volunteers about the work they do based on their faith and compassion.
After the show was aired, the mood changed. Under the headline `What Would Jesus Do?’ India Knight, Sunday Times columnist, said it made her “heart-burstingly proud of the BBC”.
The Bishop of Leeds, the Rt. Rev. Nick Baines, said the programme had taken viewers “to a place of worship at the raw end of life” - and the Daily Telegraph said Songs of Praise had challenged ”the widely held perception that religious programmes are quaint and irrelevant”.
5. Genius of The Ancient World Buddha
TX: 05/08/2015 BBC Four Dur: 60’00”
Production Company: BBC Religion and Ethics
Historian Bettany Hughes travels to India, Greece and China, on the trail of three giants of ancient philosophy: The Buddha, Socrates and Confucius. All three lived, between the 6th and 5th century BC, during a period of unprecedented intellectual development: 100 years that changed the way we see ourselves forever.
Buddha These trailblazers embodied the shift, from a primarily supernatural worldview, to one where rational thought offered new, exciting possibilities.
In this first episode Bettany Hughes investigates the revolutionary ideas of the Buddha. In his 20s the Buddha abandoned his family and homeland in the foothills of the Himalayas to embark on an ambitious philosophical quest to find a solution to human suffering. On the Indian plains he experienced the challenging ideas and extreme methods of wandering 'truth seeks'. But it was only when he found his own middle way that he finally attained enlightenment - Nivana: a state of being where all delusion, desire and suffering were extinguished. The Buddha's philosophy would inspire a diverse belief system which spread across the Far East and beyond, shaping the lives of hundreds of millions to this day. Drawing on archaeology and expert opinion, Bettany investigates this inspiring figure.
6. Joan of Arc: God's Holy Warrior
TX: 26/05/2015 BBC 2 Dur: 59’00”
Production Company: Matchlight Limited
Joan of Arc is a saint, revered as one of the most outstanding women of the Middle Ages. But by viewing Joan as a saint, people tend to forget the extraordinary nature of her life: a 17-year-old girl who came from nowhere and seized an exceptional moment, leading an army in a world that believed that women could neither fight nor lead. In a new film, Helen Castor reveals the reasons Joan was able to do what she did, reasons that sprang from the times in which she lived but had nothing to do with her being a saint. This is the story of the real Joan - in part a striking tale of religious and military events, and in part a psychological courtroom drama that has been passed down through history from the records of her trial.
The Guardian 26.05.15 "Dr Helen Castor stripped away the accreted layers of subsequent interpretation, myth and legend to give us the barest, cleanest bones she could of what is, even at its sparest, an astonishing story."
The Times 26.05.15 "God's Warrior was elegant, engaging and rigorous. [Dr Helen] Castor wanted us, as Joan's image becomes appropriated by cause after cause, not to forget the human underneath."
The Independent 26.05.15 "There was a lot of walking round medieval ramparts bathed in beatific light, which might have felt trivial if it was not for [Dr Helen Castor's] access to contemporary documents from the trial. She reconstructed original dialogue and where some historical reconstructions jar, the words were the stars here."
Daily Mail 26.05.15 " Phew! A history show without the usual high-tech histrionics - With such a theatrical story, of a peasant girl inspired by visions of angels to lead armies and treat kings as her equals, the temptation must have been to fill the screen with computer effects and extras. ... It proved far more effective to let Moffett, a former star of The Bill whose husband is David Tennant, tell the story in Joan's own words. We were allowed to picture the scenes ourselves - such as this 17-year- old illiterate girl crossing hundreds of miles of enemy territory, during France's sadistic civil wars in the 1420s."
7. Muslim Drag Queen
TX: 24/08/2015 Channel 4 Dur: 60’00” (00’47”)
Production Company: Swan Films No additional information supplied.
8. A Deadly Warning: Srebrenica Revisited
TX: 06/07/2015 BBC One Dur: 30’00”
Production Company: BBC Religion and Ethics
Journalist Myriam François-Cerrah travels to Bosnia to mark the 20th anniversary of the worst atrocity in Europe since World War II.
In July 1995, in the midst of war in the former Yugoslavia, around 8,000 Muslim men and teenaged boys were massacred at Srebrenica. Now Myriam, a British Muslim, is visiting the site with a group of young people - all of whom were born in the year of the genocide. In an often emotional trip they learn first-hand how easily prejudice can take hold and why this story has important lessons for us all in multicultural Britain today.
The diverse group of young people include Julie, the daughter of Colonel Bob Stewart, who was United Nations Commander of the British forces in Bosnia in the early 90s; and medical student Abdul, who is astonished that he didn’t hear about the story in school. He wonders why, as he feels that “when Muslim people die you don’t learn about it as much.”
The group are all ‘delegates’ for a British charity called Remembering Srebrenica. It is the organiser of UK events for Srebrenica Memorial Day on the 11 July. The UK is the only EU country to officially designate such a day of remembrance.
On this trip, Myriam observes the British students discovering what the story of Srebrenica means for us in Britain today and why it’s so important to remember