Two young boys explore the metropolis of Lagos with their estranged father in Director Akinola Davies, Jr.’s drama from Nigeria, My Father’s Shadow.

Set over the course of a single day, Davies’ semi-autobiographical tale tells the story of Aki and Remi who reconnect with the father who’s been missing most of their lives. But what begins as a reunion quietly unravels into something deeper as they witness both the city’s magnitude and their father’s daily struggles as the political unrest of the 1993 Nigerian election crisis threatens their journey home.

My Father’s Shadow was nominated for the Un Certain Regard award and the Golden Camera award at the 78th Cannes Film Festival.

October 20, after the Special Projects Committee Global Cinema Series screening in Los Angeles and via video from Brazil, Davies discussed the making of the film during a Q&A moderated by Special Projects Committee Co-Chair Rachel Raimist and revealed the complications of shooting on film in a continent with no film development labs.

“So, there's no lab on the Continent," Davies explained. "We had to ship film we had. We had a couple of young filmmakers who shadowed me for this film, and one of them was based in Dublin. She ended up being in Nigeria when we were shooting and she was meant to come back [to Dublin] halfway through the shoot. So, we were like, 'Why don't you take some film?' Another producer took some film, and you just keep going back and forth. I mean, logistically, it's a nightmare. No one really wants to be in that position where you're taking cans through scanners consistently worried about what you could lose."

Davies went on to describe the creative choices he made in effectively telling the story. "We just filmed nature. We filmed nature in a way that we really respected it - whether it's from the minutiae or looking down or looking up or whether it's in the middle of a big metropolis. Nature is going to exist and nature is going to dominate in a way that isn't forceful. And creating a story from the perspective of kids allowed us to be that curious. They allowed us to build the camera and the language of the camera in a way that we can have these moments that we focus on ants carrying a big ant away or we focus on a bunch of swallows on telephone wires flying away. Because I think children have that innocence, they have that honesty, they have that curiosity. And we wanted the camera to have that because really the film is from the perspective of the kids."

My Father’s Shadow is Davies’ feature directorial debut. His other directorial credits include the short films Gucci: Gift 2020, Lizard and Hillu; and episodes of the series Foresight and Black to Life.