While political discord might form the architecture of this film, its brilliance comes from the quiet moments it manages to collect in the middle of chaos.
For Wale Davies, the events of June 1993 in Nigeria and their aftermath can be distilled and split into two significant parts. "The collective groan of a nation on June 23 (the day a much-awaited presidential election was forcibly annulled) and the collective cheer when we won the Nations Cup in 1994, just a year later," he says.
These moments showed Davies how the actions of a few could dampen or uplift the spirits of a whole nation and raised questions about the small, untold stories in the background as these events played out.
Davies was 11 years old in 1993 when General Ibrahim Babangida cancelled a democratic election that MKO Abiola had won, and incited months of deadly protests. Decades later, Davies, alongside his brother Akinola Davies Jr., returned to that period in My Father's Shadow, a semi-autobiographical retelling of the events of June 12, 1993, through the eyes of a father and his two sons.
Directed and written by Davies Jr. and co-written by Davies, My Father's Shadow is set to premiere at the Cannes Film Festival this Sunday in the Un Certain Regard selection. It is the first Nigerian film to be officially selected by Cannes, and was snapped up by cinephile platform MUBI even before it arrived at the festival. Ahead of the film's official premiere, the Davies brothers dial in to a call from OkayAfrica from different parts of the world; Davies Jr in Cannes, and Davies in Lagos.
The film, which marks Davies Jr's first feature since his Sundance prize-winning short Lizard, plays out over that pivotal day in what was once Nigeria’s capital city, Lagos, but bears implications that trickle through generations. The story follows an estranged father (Sope Disiru) who takes his two sons (played by Godwin Egbo and Chibuike Marvellous Egbo) on a journey to the big city and the political unrest that endangers their return home.
While political discord might form the architecture of this film, its brilliance comes from the quiet moments it manages to collect in the middle of chaos. The film explores the intricacies and nuances of a father torn between duty, love, hope, and despair. My Father's Shadow is most poetic when it focuses on the mundane amidst consequential events. Although we can tell the nation is on the brink of a new dawn, the camera follows the minutiae of everyday life for this family. We see the trees sing, the land breathe, the hours pass along with the form of a day tinged with meaning. This propensity for glorifying the everyday is a well-developed perspective inherent in many of Davies Jr's works. "I think I am quite obsessed with the experience of being," he tells OkayAfrica.
"The mundane is really about how you perceive it," he adds. "To live life in a Black body, some days you feel like you're in a romance. Some days, you hear sirens and feel like you're in a horror movie. How those moments make you feel can bring magic to the simplicity in life that gets overlooked. And what we're trying to say is that those moments matter."
Mining history
For the Davies brothers, this story is a way to make sense of the loss of a father they didn't know very well. Their father passed when Davies Jr was 20 months old, and unlike their older siblings, Davies and Davies Jr didn't get to spend enough time with him. They were also deeply intrigued by moments in Nigerian history that are often overlooked and underexplored in art.
The film marks Akinola Davies Jr's first feature since his Sundance prize-winning short Lizard.
Photo by Zainab Abelque
"We've heard about key moments in our history, but as an adult, I'm curious about what the people [who lived through that time] felt. Mining into June 12, which I saw from a child's perspective at age 11, and speaking to the guys who were on the front line, who were in the student union, who were marching, who were angry, it was a process of self-discovery," Davies says.
"On the one hand, we were mining memory because we lived it, and we had a lot to mine from, but it's also just trying to portray the reality of what it means to be Nigerian," Davies Jr. adds. "It's peaceful one moment, and it's chaotic the next. In addition, we did a lot of research about that period to try and understand what it was like from a more adult and political perspective. But the joy of being artists and creators is that we have creative license to expand that and make that feel much more synonymous with the themes of what we're trying to do. [And] what we're trying to do is tell honest stories."
With history once removed as a subject in Nigerian schools, art remains the only place where the past can be revisited and turned to for meaning. "We don't have enough resources and access to people's emotions, thoughts, and feelings at specific moments; we get it in summary notes,” he adds. “It was just super interesting for me because within that discovery is where the magic is. You can tell a real story and honor people, and we have such rich material to build from.”
Creative common ground
Davies (a record label head and the second half of Nigerian hip-hop duo Show Dem Camp) and Davies Jr (a multidisciplinary artist) have fundamentally different disciplines, but it didn't hinder their creative collaboration. "I think our trajectories have been relatively similar," Davies Jr admits. "We grew up together, and I think [we share] a lot of morals and ambition. The way we see the world, and how we want to relate to people, is fundamentally from a shared place. Beyond that, we're very social and like to create communities."
And much of the driving force behind their work, Davies Jr says, is borne from a duty to serve and create for, and alongside, that community. My Father's Shadow is a work born from a community of friends and close collaborators, determined to make something outstanding. The pair worked on the script for the film for several years before finalizing the story in 2020.
Wale Davies is the second half of Show Dem Camp, Tems’ co-manager, and the co-writer of ‘My Father’s Shadow’
Photo by Zainab Abelque
This process was made easier because, despite their varying disciplines, the Davies brothers are highly accomplished storytellers. "Whether it's in music or whether it's in visuals or narrative, and even the way we speak ... Listening to Wale talk, he takes you on a journey and paints such vivid pictures, and I think he's adept at doing that with words whereas I might be more adept at doing that with pictures. There is a sense of passion for what we do, which translates to how we collaborate," Davies Jr says.
Also central to the core of their creative partnership is a deep sense of familiarity that makes honesty and truth-telling possible. "We can tell when the other might be lying or hiding something. If truth is at the core of our collaborative practice, it is a good springboard for allowing ideas to evolve and marinate,” Davies Jr. adds.
Both Davies and Davies Jr. are aware of the incredible weight they carry as they represent Nigeria in making its Cannes debut. But they are letting the pressure rest on how the quality of the work is received and not solely on what it represents. "I'm more excited about people watching the film," Davies says. "As much as I enjoy the hype and the accolades, it's really about the work. When it finally goes out into the world, the whole conversation changes, and hopefully some of the dialogue we intended for the film can finally kick off."
The dialogues Davies speaks of are "Mainly fatherhood and what that means. It's always been this balance of trying to work to provide for your family, and this idea that you are the provider versus your presence and your time. How do you achieve that balance when the realities are even more stark?" he asks. "And then nationhood as well; just the concept of what your nation means and what it's meant to provide. There are other deeper things that I want people to catch when they watch."
Davies Jr. describes it as a privilege. "It's a real honor. We just wanted to make something that we feel extremely proud of, that shows the Nigeria we grew up in on screen," he says. "As long as we are proud of what we've done, I think the rest is just a bonus that is still a massive honor and something we don't take for granted."
