This film is part of Free
Home Life
Join the Hunter family for a tour of colonial domestic life in 1920s north India in this three-part amateur film.
Overview
Made by an English family living in north India during the heyday of the Raj, this amateur film reveals the grandeur in which middle-class English colonials lived. It also lets us see how the labours of a large retinue of Indian servants helped to create the intimate spaces of ‘private’ family life, including the summer retreat to the hill station of Mussoorie.
In showing us their ‘home away from home’ the Hunters’ film gives no indication of the anti-British agitation that animated Indian politics in this period. The film was made in 1928, the year in which Indian leaders boycotted the British Government-appointed Indian Statutory Commission and began to draw up their own constitution for an independent India. Dr. Eleanor Newbigin (SOAS University of London)
Related
New Perspectives: La Haine New Perspectives: La Haine
Short documentary 2025 4 mins
Charlie Hammersley, a student from Northumbria University, explains how Mathieu Kassovitz's 1995 film holds up a mirror to society.
Dreamers Q&A Dreamers Q&A
Inside Film 2025 30 mins
The film-makers behind a haunting tale of love and community within a UK immigration detention centre visited the BFI Southbank to discuss their film.
Paul Thomas Anderson and Leonardo DiCaprio in Conversation Paul Thomas Anderson and Leonardo DiCaprio in Conversation
Inside Film 2025 50 mins
Paul Thomas Anderson and Leonardo DiCaprio in Conversation at BFI Southbank, discussing the making of One Battle After Another.
Laura Mulvey in Conversation Laura Mulvey in Conversation
Inside Film 2025 76 mins
Laura Mulvey in conversation, following her BFI Fellowship Award.
George Clooney in Conversation George Clooney in Conversation
Inside Film 2025 74 mins
George Clooney visited BFI Southbank to look back on his life and career.
Chloé Zhao Screen Talk | BFI London Film Festival 2025 Chloé Zhao Screen Talk | BFI London Film Festival 2025
Inside Film 2025 65 mins
The Oscar®- winning director of Nomadland discusses her unique approach to filmmaking and the inspiration behind the adaptation of Hamnet.