My Brother the Devil: love among street gangs

Sally El Hosaini recently won the London Film Festival Best British Newcomer prize for her debut feature My Brother the Devil.

The director Sally El Hosaini recently won the London Film Festival Best British Newcomer prize for her debut feature My Brother the Devil.

Set in and around an estate in Hackney, the story centres on the unconditional love between two brothers, Mo (Fady Elsayed) and Rashid (James Floyd).

The 36-year-old El Hosaini, originally from Swansea, has taken the conventions of the urban drama – the drugs, guns, violence and sex – and spun them on their head by infusing the story with threads concerning the Arab Spring and homosexuality.

She was inspired to make a film about brotherhood following the death of her own brother when he was 24, and she embedded herself with the local Hackney kids for five years for her research. It shows: this film finally takes British urban “yoof” drama in a new direction.

‘My Brother the Devil’ opens on 9 November