Western Sydney in feature film Here Out West

From blonde brick unit blocks to multilingual performances, a soon-to-be-released feature film about Sydney’s west will shine an honest and thought-provoking spotlight on life in the ‘burbs.

Writer and actor Arka Das is confident new feature film Here Out West has appealing storylines that will draw audiences beyond the hub of where it is filmed and set — the melting pot of western Sydney.

The drama features eight mini stories that cleverly meld and is spoken in nine languages including English, Kurdish, Cantonese, Tagalog and Bengali, which is the native tongue of Bangladesh-born, Das.

The opening scene follows a grandmother Nancy, who kidnaps her granddaughter from hospital after authorities plan to taker her from her young daughter’s care after she is deemed unfit to raise the child.

Together with her Arabic-speaking Lebanese neighbour, eight-year-old Amirah, whom she is babysitting, they flee the hospital.

Genevieve Lemon as Nancy, who kidnaps her grandchild.

The escape sets off a chain of events spanning one dramatic, poignant day in western Sydney that eventually unites strangers in a hospital.

That includes Das’s character, Robi, who plays the son of Bangladesh migrants and is mates with an Afghanistan-born Rashid and African-Australian Dino. Multiple scenes for the Brotherhood storyline are filmed at a familiar unit block at Main St, Blacktown, opposite the hospital (though Here Out West is not shot there).

As a one-time Blacktown dweller who used to hang with his mates at the same unit block while growing up, Das was thrilled he now returned as a thespian.

Arka Das (red shirt) in a scene from Here Out West, which was partly filmed at Blacktown.

Robi winds up in hospital after he is punched to the ground. It is there that he meets mixed-race woman Ashmita in the Eternal Dance scene, where he assists her interpret her father’s dying wish. The two bond over their shared heritage and eagerness to fit and often shed their ethnic roots while growing up.

The importance of family is vivid throughout the anthology.

“I think people can connect to it,’’ Das said.

“I think it represents so many migrant communities in Australia but more so than that, I think it’s a cool Australian film and I hope it changes the landscape of Australian film.’’

Das hopes western Sydney’s beauty is portrayed along with its grit.

Arka Das and Leah Vandenberg’s characters cross in her hour of need at hospital.

“I think it’s going to be confronting but hopefully people will feel represented,’’ Das said.

“I think so many people that live in western Sydney, that grew up in western Sydney have felt they never see it on a big screen like that and when they do see it, it’s generally a negative stigma but this film captures the heart of western Sydney and captures the heart of characters.

“It’s a film all Australians will watch.’’

Emerald Productions and Co-Curious originally hatched the idea not as a film but to merge western Sydney writers in July 2018, but “what would happen was a little bit of magic”, Das recalled.

Mia-Lore Bayeh as Amirah in Here Out West, a movie that initially began as a project to bring together western Sydney writers.

A film to capture an audience bereft of diverse stories began production in late 2020 with eight writers and five directors.

It debuted at the Sydney Film Festival in November and will be released in cinemas on February 3.

Das, a De La Salle College Ashfield graduate, who grew up in Blacktown, Lidcombe, Strathfield and Harris Park, where his parents still live and where he spends a lot of his time when he is not in Camperdown, implored the community to see the film early.

“I would encourage people to see it the first weekend because for a film like ours it takes numbers,’’ Das said.

“It can’t compete with big films like Marvel. The good thing is we’re getting a pretty wide release in NSW and Victoria.”

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