Imran Perretta on his debut feature Ish: ‘Trauma has informed so much of my creative work’

In every coming of age story there is an awakening, a revelatory moment where our protagonist transforms from child to adult. It might be an instance of first love, first loss or fresh knowledge. For Bangladeshi British film-maker, composer and visual artist Imran Perretta, his real-life awakening was a racially motivated police stop and search when he was just 13.

“It was after the 9/11 attacks in 2001, I was a kid and I was dragged into the back of a police car because of the colour of my skin,” he says. “In that moment, I understood so much about what it means to be visible and targeted and it forced me into the adult world against my will. 

“I’m 37 now and I’ve been reckoning with that incident ever since. I’ve never quite been able to let go of it.”

Read the interview in Hyphen.

[This piece was published on 26/11/25]