In conversation with Seemab Gul on her debut feature Ghost School
Though education faces its own battles in London and province-wide with respect to government funding and democratic community involvement in schools, millions of children around the world hope for the day just one school reopens. Seemab Gul’s debut feature film Ghost School (2025) explores the reality of one such child. The film recently had its world premiere at the 50th Toronto International Film Festival.
The film explores the phenomenon of “ghost schools” as they take place in some parts of South and Central Asia, referring to schools that are operational on paper, but in reality are half built, empty, or not standing at all. In the film, Rabia (played by Nazualiya Arsalan), a ten-year-old Pakistani girl, is incredibly dismayed to learn that the only school in her village has closed and rather determined to get to the bottom of why it won’t reopen. The film explores the values of a small village guided by Rabia’s curiosity, and takes its viewers on a journey of uncovering corruption through a child’s overactive imagination. Written and directed by screenwriter, director and producer Seemab Gul, this film reflects Gul’s drive to explore social-political themes by weaving together documentary, fictional, and performative elements.
Antler River Media’s Emmanuel Akanbi had the opportunity to speak with the London (England)-based filmmaker at the festival.
EA: I really, really enjoyed Ghost School. It was a very, very powerful film for me. I just thought it was such a wonderful film exploring corruption and the value of education. I would love to get more of your perspective on the film and the journey of making it.
Seemab Gul: I went about asking people what ghost schools were, and I got so many mixed answers in Pakistan — from completely denying that ghost schools existed to being completely ignorant about them [as a concept]. I got so many different responses so I went about telling the story in the way that Rabia experiences the mystery around the ghost school — its kind of what I experienced when I went about it.
In 2022, I covered the floods for Green-Peace International, and I went to every corner of Pakistan and there, with my own eyes — in interior Balochistan, interior Sindh, South Punjab — I saw ghost schools, ghost colleges and even ghost hospitals. We approximate that there are about 1500 ghost schools, leaving over 22 million children out of education — and that’s only in Pakistan. Further afield, in the neighbouring region of Afghanistan, no girl can go to school after the age of 13. My ending was kind of inspired by that fact, where her mother says, “You won’t be able to carry this on for very long.” So even though they make a sacrifice and try a solution, it is a temporary solution and thus bittersweet. Did that answer your question?
EA: Yes, that was another one of my questions, actually. I was going to ask if you saw the ending as an optimistic ending? I watched it and was like “Oh, this is really sad. She’s not going to be able to go to school. This is not gonna last for a very long time, but she’s happy.” And the horse came to fly her [there], she was looking for it, she was happy. Did you see that as an optimistic ending or just more as bittersweet?
Seemab Gul: It is a bittersweet ending, but it is giving her… I think she’s using her imagination after questioning the villagers around her. For me, education is about questioning the world around us. ‘Cause, even in the West, you have experts coming out of being physicists and scientists, and they have blinders on, and they only are experts in their own field. But we’re talking about the kind of education that I believe in, [which is] questioning everything around us. Rabia questions everything around her, and then when she does not get an answer that is satisfactory, she uses her imagination to get what she wants — whether that’s temporary or not. So, the flying horse is Rabia freeing herself from her constraints and imagining a freedom that allows her to be educated.
EA: So much of that is carried by the wonderful performance of Nazualiya Arsalan taking the journey of a curious child trying to understand something. All children are innately curious, [they] want to understand more about the world, and [Rabia] is really going on this big journey to discover what’s going on. I just wanted to ask about the casting process and finding such a talented young actress to play the role. What was that like?
Seemab Gul: Yeah, I think I was just super lucky to find Nazualiya Arsalan, who’s actually been a professional actress since the age of 7. And I found, basically, a child professional actor, which is rare and just really, really lucky. Of course, I had to untrain some of the melodrama that she does for TV dramas in Pakistan. But she also does commercials and photography where a lot of spoken word is not there. So, for her, it was her first role as a lead actor, and she was very, very professional. She knew all her lines and everything else. With all the other actors, we worked with non-actors, some professional actors. It was a very mixed bag. And then I also had a cameo role — I tried. And so my [Assistant Director] and the cinematographer were directing me. I also needed coaching in advance, as well as dialogue coaching, as well as accent coaching to get it right. It was very hard. Acting is hard as it is. But it’s twice as hard when also producing, worrying about money, anything else, which was a constant struggle when making this film.
EA: I’m sure there’s a lot on your mind as you’re trying to make the film.
Seemab Gul: Exactly. It was the limit of my multitasking as a producer, writer, director and actor.
EA: I did notice that there were a lot of wonderful songs throughout the movie, and I was wondering if these had any symbolism for you or for the film. It also aided in a lot of the long shots in the movie, where Rabia was walking or waiting for something.
Seemab Gul: The music in the film kind of touches upon the spirituality of the region. So it was in Sindh. Our kind of imaginary village [in Ghost School] was in interior Sindh on the outskirts of Karachi. And in that region we have sufi music which is pervasive in folklore. So, my film being kind of folklore and mythological, I thought it would be very interesting to incorporate and embrace spiritual sufi music. Actually, the music is recorded on a documentary shoot at a shrine in interior Sindh. I think the idea of escape, the idea of barakah in Islamic mythology and escape and elevation somehow feed the fable and work towards this ending.
EA: Very interesting to know. Another question I had, I think, because of how sharp the discussion of ghost schools is and the involvement of school teachers not being able to work or get paid, and thus not staying to teach at a school and that contributing to the ghost school phenomenon. I was wondering if you had any insights on scholasticide around the world where educators and scholars are murdered, which similarly hurts students and young people who want to [learn] but don’t have access to those educators anymore.
Seemab Gul: I think we — “we” as like, adults collectively —are responsible for education and the future generations. And if we neglect this, I think we are neglecting our own future as a people. It’s not like, oh, this region and that region and this place and that place. Education and the wellbeing of children is everyone’s responsibility and no one is free until we’re all free. I was shocked and saddened to see how everyone — the world — looks away while schools and colleges are being bombed and neglected. But yet, coming from a developing nation like Pakistan, the perpetuating cycle of poverty and ignorance and the world looking away is kind of similar and parallel to, sadly, the wars going on and the genocide in Palestine. Because, ultimately, it comes down to the poorest of the poor suffering, and the peasants and their children not having access to education, and the wealthy nations look away. But, I think, it will come back to haunt us. Not only the wars and the genocide, but also — what happens to entire nations where millions of children are left without education? It’s our collective responsibility and my film questions the concept. I do not have clear answers, but I hope it opens debates.
EA: I had read an interview of yours that your debut feature was going to be a film called Haven of Hope. Was that still something on your mind while making this?
Seemab Gul: I became an accidental producer multiple times. I never intended to be a producer, I’m a writer-director predominantly. It’s because my other project was meant to be shot last year, and it was postponed due to multiple reasons, and thus I decided that I was ready to film a feature film. I already had the crew, and I was let down by one of the producers so I decided I was going to make a film no matter what and that film became Ghost School. Haven of Hope is in pre-production now and we are shooting in November — it was four years in the making, it’s completely financed. It’s just the industry is such that… I guess Ghost School proves that you don’t need many, many years of development or many, many years of financing. A decent film can be made in shorter periods of time, provided there’s some basic resources and the freedom to do so. And I think I’m lucky in the sense that I originally self-financed it and later got Red Sea Fund and Hamburg Film Fund in post-production stage. But I had the full freedom for a debut feature to tell the story I wanted in the way that I wanted — in terms of tone, and genre, and mode, and the type of storytelling: slightly slower, and slightly different. Whereas Haven of Hope is a five-country co-production with over seven producers. So although we have a decent budget compared to Ghost School, there’s a lot of other people involved. And then I’m also writing for an English-language film for Film4 and that’s where many more executives [will] get involved and you no longer have the freedom that I believe you should have in your debut feature films, where you can hone your own original and unique voice as a storyteller but also a filmmaker.
EA: Have you had any distribution success with Ghost School?
Seemab Gul: So we have MPM Premium as our world sale agents and I hope it will do a great job in sales and distribution. We are looking for distribution in North America —-Canada and USA. And, of course, we’re just starting the festival cycle with TIFF as the world premiere, so anything is possible!
EA: This is very exciting, and it really was a wonderful feature, so congratulations again.
Seemab Gul: Thank you so much.
