A Sundance award-winning documentary that captures the power of civil resistance with gripping immediacy, as it chronicles the Kenmure Street protests in Glasgow, after two Sikh men were taken from their home into a police van that was prevented by the community from departing.
Review #3,078
Dir. Felipe Bustos Sierra
2026 | UK | Documentary | 98min | Various aspect ratios | English
PG13 (passed clean) for some coarse language
Cast: –
Plot: In May 2021, a UK Home Office dawn raid triggers one of the most spontaneous and successful acts of civil resistance in recent memory. In Pollokshields, Scotland’s most diverse neighbourhood, hundreds of residents rush to the streets to stop the deportation of their neighbours.
Awards: Won World Cinema Documentary Special Jury Award for Civil Resistance (Sundance)
International Sales: The Party Film Sales
Accessibility Index
Subject Matter: Moderate – Community & Solidarity; Immigration Politics; Street Protests
Narrative Style: Straightforward
Pace: Normal
Audience Type: Slightly Mainstream
Viewed: Screener (as part of SFS Showcase)
Spoilers: No
Everybody to Kenmure Street could turn out to be one of the year’s finest documentaries, and I wouldn’t be surprised if it gets a Best Documentary Feature nomination at the 2027 Oscars.
A Sundance offering, where it won the Special Jury Award for Civil Resistance, Kenmure Street is that galvanising, grassroots work that makes us grateful to know that there are human beings in this world who are compassionate, possess moral courage, and are fearless in their actions.
In fact, one might argue that this is an action documentary, starting with the arrest of two Sikh men from their homes in the middle of Glasgow on dubious immigration charges—and not just on any fine day, but on the morning of Eid, and in a neighbourhood with a strong Muslim community.
Before the van that they were detained in could move an inch, a brave soul got underneath the vehicle. Minutes later, a small crowd formed; hours later, thousands joined in, just as the title promises. Neighbours, strangers, young and old, across ethnic and class lines, pack the street, shouting anti-establishment slogans.
“I don’t think you realise that we’re here for the long haul.”
The now iconic sight of an immobilised police van, hemmed in by a sea of commoners, even as more officers arrive, becomes emblematic of the struggle for human rights in an unforgiving world of unjust and discriminatory immigration laws. Kenmure Street will move you to tears and inspire you to take positive action to help others in need whenever you can.
At the same time, director Felipe Bustos Sierra—who previously made the animated documentary, Nae Pasaran (2018), about several Scotsmen from a Scottish Rolls-Royce factory who put down their tools and grounded part of Chile’s Air Force, as an act of solidarity against Pinochet’s brutal dictatorship—includes generous amounts of archival material of Scottish civil resistance to contextualise the events of Kenmure Street.
It’s such a balanced and insightful work on how the past greatly informs the present. With a mix of live footage, taking head interviews, and some re-enactments to protect the privacy of certain individuals, the film unfolds with gripping immediacy. I went in completely blind, watched with bated breath how it all played out, and was left shaken in the best possible way.
Grade: A-
Trailer:
Music:
Eternality Tan 