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When the UK selected Akinola Davies Jr-directed ‘My Father’s Shadow’ as its official entry for Best International Feature Film at the upcoming 98th Academy Awards, it came as a big surprise for him. As a British-Nigerian, Akinola believes that though there is a lot of difficult history since Britain had colonised Nigeria, “there are people in those places trying to move towards a better understanding of how our cultures are integrated with each other, and how we are interlinked in so many ways”.
‘My Father’s Shadow’, which premiered under Un Certain Regard, is a semi-autobiographical story co-written by Akinola and his brother Wales Davies. The film follows a father and his two children in the Nigerian capital Lagos as they are shaken by political unrest in 1993. The film, which was the first Nigerian movie to be officially selected for Cannes, won the special mention for the Caméra d’Or. Akinola’s feature debut has also secured 12 nominations for the 2025 British Independent Film Awards (BIFAs).
“When we made the film, the focus was to do right by the script we wrote since people give us all this money to make a film. Then making the film and editing it. I’m really proud of any awards or any recognition that the film received. Though the director is someone who always gets the praise, there is a community of filmmakers, cast and crew that’s involved,” says Akinola.,” says Akinola. He was speaking to The Indian Express at the International Film Festival of India (IFFI), Goa, where his feature was screened.
Unlike ‘My Father’s Shadow’, most Nigerian films are commercial. “Inspired by Hollywood and Bollywood, the film industry in Nigeria is called Nollywood. My film represents art house filmmaking. It’s important for me to bring resources back to Nigeria and empower the local film community,” says Akinola, whose film was shot on location in Lagos and Ibadan.
For his deeply personal film debut feature, Akinola chose to collaborate with his screenwriter brother. They also worked with two researchers for the political context and tried to move away from the stereotypes of what people expect of Nigeria and Nigerian films. Instead, they tried to show the Nigeria they knew and they grew up in.
Akinola was 20 months old when his father passed away. “We remember being with our father on bed. We don’t know if we made this up or someone told it to us. But the most important thing is that we feel that it’s our memory and no one can take it away from us. That’s the spirit we wanted to channel into the film. We recreated this memory as the film’s opening sequence,” says Akinola, who graduated from the New York Film Academy in 2009.
Initially, Wales wrote ‘My Father’s Shadow’ as a short. “I asked him if he would let me direct it and he agreed,” says Akinola. When the feature was selected for the Un Certain Regard, it created history for Nigeria. “It was a very emotional day for me. As a first-time filmmaker, it’s an incredible platform to start my career at Cannes. The film has now brought me to IFFI, Goa.”
Since Nigeria was colonised by the British, the writer-director believes that it is important that they learn each other’s stories. “What we’re trying to do is tell a story that really reflects us. We’ve been supported by BBC Films, the British Film Institute, MUBI and Match Factory in order to be able to tell this story. It represents that there is a leaning towards telling more international stories because the UK and London are very cosmopolitan. It only benefits us knowing more about each other,” he says.
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