THIS is Sol Harris, one of newest faces of the British film industry.

He may be just 27 but the former Lymm High School pupil oversaw a cast and crew of more than 100 for Finding Fatimah. Sol worked as the producer with director Oz Arshad on the rom com which examines the stigma of divorce in the Asian community.

The British Muslim TV-funded project, mostly filmed in Greater Manchester, was originally made for Islamic charity, Penny Appeal, to help raise money. But Icon Productions, behind the likes of Hacksaw Ridge and Mr Holmes, saw the £325,000 film’s potential to appeal to a wider audience and supported its release in 40 cinemas across the country.

Sol, who went to Oughtrington Primary School, said: “We always thought we’ll make it as good as it can be for the charity and then pursue film festivals and try and get it out on DVD at the end of it. But because the budget was tiny we just never entertained the idea it would get to cinemas.

“Icon came along and we were able to get it in front of their eyes. They said it had potential and snapped it up. It came out of nowhere really. It’s blown us away that it’s gone this far.

“It’s almost unheard of for a film of this budget to go out to so many cinemas. There are a few films that have been on more screens with an even smaller budget but they are things like the Blair Witch Project and Paranormal Activity.”

Sol and Oz originally got the idea after working together on the documentary Half My Faith, All My Struggle about British Muslims struggling to remarry after a divorce.

Sol added: “In Islam, marriage is one of the pillars of the religion. They call it your ‘deen’ which is your spiritual wellbeing. Half of that is being married and having a home life and a secure family. So it’s a really big deal to them but all these prejudices exist around things like divorce.

“Over the course of that we ended up doing loads of research and met all kinds of people. We drew on what we learnt there. We felt there was a lot of stuff there that hadn’t been explored in films before. Oz is Muslim and divorced so he’s been through it first-hand and was also drawing on his own experience.”

Sol’s role involved dealing with the finances, negotiating with crew, cast and agents and general problem solving on set when things went wrong. One of his most surreal moments was when Yusuf Islam (Cat Stevens) allowed the use of one of his songs in the film.

Sol also helped secure cameo appearances from a host of stars from the world of soaps and comedy like Dave Spikey, Denise Welch and Ewen MacIntosh from The Office.

He and Oz even managed to convince Nina Wadia, from EastEnders and Goodness Gracious Me to take a lead role.

Sol said: “It was just a case of begging her agent to put the script in front of her. I think initially she was quite hesitant as with films of this scale you never know what you’re getting into. But she liked the script so she gave us a chance. She ended up really enjoying it and one of the potential ideas being kicked around as a follow-up is a spin-off with her character.”

Sol also hopes the film shows Muslims as integrated members of British society at a time when there is increased prejudice due to the political climate in the wake of the recent Islamist terror attacks.

He added: “We wanted it to appeal to both conservative and liberal Muslims. But at the same time we didn’t want to make a ‘Muslim’ film which was about religion or politics. We just wanted to make a film that had characters in it that happened to be Muslim.

“That in itself was almost the point we were making. It doesn’t have to be a film that makes an issue of that. That was a big thing going in and it paid off because I think hat’s a big part of why Icon were willing to come and put it in cinemas.”