If headlines in the national media are to be believed, Folkestone is simultaneously the front line of the small boats “invasion” and a rapidly-gentrifying seaside destination of choice for wealthy Londoners moving out to the coast.

Director Jessi Gutch and producer Charlie Phillips, both recent arrivals from the capital, are making a documentary they hope will reveal a more complex – and uplifting – picture of life in the town. Reporter Rhys Griffiths went to meet them to find out more…

In what feel like increasingly polarised times, the idea that we have “far more in common than that which divides us” is a comforting thought, if only we can realise it.

Those words were spoken by Jo Cox in her maiden speech in the House of Commons. Little more than a year later, the MP was murdered. But her words have become a rallying cry for those striving to bring communities together when others seek to sow division.

Cox’s message runs through the heart of a new documentary, Blue Has No Borders, which its makers hope will use the recent story of one Kent town to show what can happen when we reach out and connect with people who are not like us.

Charlie Phillips, one of the film’s producers, explained the message it is hoped the film can convey.

He said: “We live in such a divisive society, but we’re not that different from one another, even if we have different political beliefs or different backgrounds.

“That shouldn't be a controversial or shocking thing, but it feels like it is.

“I think Folkestone is really interesting for sort of forcing people from different backgrounds to get to know each other and get on, because the community is quite integrated.”

Mr Phillips, 44, is one of a number of people who have moved from London to the Kent coast in recent years, part of the wave of so-called DFLs – down from London – who have decided to relocate to towns like Folkestone, Margate and Deal.

Sitting down over coffee alongside Blue Has No Borders director Jessi Gutch, herself a fellow transplant from the capital to the coast, he admits some Londoners can arrive with something of a “colonial mentality” – imagining themselves bringing their progressive cultural and political beliefs to what they might perceive as insular and reactionary small towns.

Both Phillips and Gutch, 32, react with a knowing laugh when asked about the DFL label and what they think of it.

Ms Gutch said: “I literally started it [the film] on arriving, so I had very much that kind of outsider mentality, I guess.

“Probably my own prejudices, from growing up in London, about small towns and then by the end, over three years, which is actually quite a long time, now I very much feel like this is my home.

“So it's quite interesting because the film sort of tracks that in a way.

“That wasn't ever necessarily something I was thinking about at the time, but it was a nice kind of journey that became also partly about my perspective as the filmmaker but also someone arriving, thinking they're right and then having their perception changed.”

She continued: “I was also conscious of being arguably part of the gentrification, I was conscious of that.

“So I was definitely aware of not wanting to come and not talk to anybody other than the other people who've come from London, and it'd be this weird thing of moving somewhere but then only hanging out with people who've also moved there.

“I think early on there were people who were subverting my expectations of things. You'd end up chatting to someone in a bar and then them being like, ‘Oh yeah, I was born here’, and then me assuming that maybe they wouldn't like the changes [happening in the town] and them being like, ‘Oh my god, I love the changes, it's great’. I think people surprise you here.”

The making of the documentary has seen the pair engage with people from all parts of the Folkestone community, starting out with conversations with around 40 potential subjects for the film before whittling that down to around 10 main protagonists.

These include Heba Arab, a Syrian refugee; Nathan Scotford, a local barber; Daniel Laws, aka Dita Garbo, a drag performer; Josie Carter, a local artist; a group of local fishermen; and Neil Jones, a Brexit activist and former councillor.

Interestingly, no one fitting the bill of a classic DFL made the cut, their stories not deemed compelling enough to examine in greater detail.

“It was just like, ‘I work from home, I commute to London, I go out drinking’,” Ms Gutch said. “There wasn’t that texture, somehow, so I guess I became that voice.”

But the wave of people leaving the capital to find a new life on the Kent coast still made for an interesting counterpoint to those making the perilous small boat crossing of the Channel, also hoping to reach the same coast and the promise of a new life of their own.

Ms Gutch said: “That was always something we were a bit aware of, that there was this interesting migration from France and then migration from London.

“I think from the people from London there is almost this kind of solidarity with the people migrating, but then maybe not as much solidarity with people who are really struggling in the town.

“And I think that was a tension that I think was something very clear early on. It's not to say you shouldn't, in my opinion, have solidarity with the refugees. But equally, you can't then just completely ignore the people who are also struggling in other ways, and kind of just say that they don't come into your sphere of support.

“I can see why that would p**s people off, if it's like you care more about them than you do the people living in poverty in town.”

In terms of finding the “more in common” that the film set out to uncover, the relationship between the director and the Brexiteer Neil Jones has come to symbolise what can happen when we reach out beyond our bubbles and engage.

Ms Gutch said: “Neil was good because me and Neil, I guess, were the sort of furthest away from each other at the beginning and then over the film we’ve become friends.

“I think it is in some ways, at least from the message of the film point of view, one of the most important - because there is actually a movement towards each other.

“That’s been a really meaningful relationship for me. If you described his profile to me before I moved here and said you're going to be mates with someone with that profile, I’d have been like, ‘What the f***?’

“Whereas now we finish filming and everything but I'll go for a drink with him at the pub. We still don't agree on some things but actually - because there's then this friendship and trust that's being built - it doesn't become this shouting match.

“We're actually listening to each other’s point of view and then often changing each other's mind about something.”

The team behind the documentary are now engaged in frantic fundraising as they work to raise the £40,000 they need to finish production and screen the film at festivals. With less than a week to go, they are still around £10,000 short of their goal.

If they can get the project across the finishing line, and bring it to a wider audience both nationally and internationally, they hope it will provide a powerful message in our age of divisions.

You can support the Blue Has No Borders project by contributing to the Kickstarter here.

Mr Phillips added: “You have got to start from a point that most people are good people who just want the best for themselves and their community, and I think if you start from that point of view you can have a better world.

“That is quite utopian, but that is what we're trying to do with the film.”