LIVING IN BONDAGE fast-forwards the Nigerian film industry

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06/24/21 • 36 min

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One of the world’s most prolific film industries was founded on the success of a direct-to-video film distributed on VHS cassettes. Host Rico Gagliano learns the history of LIVING IN BONDAGE — the indie project that launched Nigeria’s “Nollywood.” Featuring interviews with the movie’s writer/producer Okey Ogunjiofor and director Chris Obi-Rapu.
Our first season, titled “Lost in Translation,” spotlights movies that were massive cultural phenomena in their home countries, but nowhere else. With episodes spanning nearly every continent, tune in weekly to discover unique film stories from around the globe.
Each episode, we publish a complementary piece in a new series called “MUBI Podcast Expanded.” This week, film critic and culture writer Derin Ajao expands on her commentary featured in the episode, examining this monumental film’s influence in the early days of Nollywood and its recent 2019 sequel LIVING IN BONDAGE: BREAKING FREE. Read the article here.
MUBI is a global streaming service, production company and film distributor. A place to discover and watch beautiful, interesting, incredible films. A new hand-picked film arrives on MUBI, every single day. From iconic directors, to emerging auteurs. All carefully chosen by MUBI’s curators.

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Our first season, titled “Lost in Translation,” spotlights movies that were massive cultural phenomena in their home countries, but nowhere else. With episodes spanning nearly every continent, tune in weekly to discover unique film stories from around the globe.
Each episode, we publish a complementary piece in MUBI's online film magazine Notebook in a new series called “MUBI Podcast Expanded.” This week, you can check out Rico's extended interview with director Bruno Barreto, where he discusses his love for John Ford, Pietro Germi and Francois Truffaut and shares more behind-the-scenes details about the making of DONA FLOR AND HER TWO HUSBANDS. Read the article here.
MUBI is a global streaming service, production company and film distributor. A place to discover and watch beautiful, interesting, incredible films. A new hand-picked film arrives on MUBI, every single day. From iconic directors, to emerging auteurs. All carefully chosen by MUBI’s curators.

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Our first season, titled “Lost in Translation,” spotlights movies that were massive cultural phenomena in one country, but nowhere else. With episodes spanning nearly every continent, tune in weekly to discover unique film stories from around the globe.
Each episode, we publish a complementary piece in a new series called “MUBI Podcast Expanded.” This week, film professor and historian Masha Salazkina adds to her commentary featured in this episode, discussing her love for international films growing up in the Soviet Union in the late 70s and early 80s. Read the article here.
MUBI is a global streaming service, production company and film distributor. A place to discover and watch beautiful, interesting, incredible films. A new hand-picked film arrives on MUBI, every single day. From iconic directors, to emerging auteurs. All carefully chosen by MUBI’s curators.

MUBI Podcast - LIVING IN BONDAGE fast-forwards the Nigerian film industry

Transcript

00:00:00.000

[Rico Gagliano] Heads up. This episode contains spoilers. [Men converse in Igbo] [Rico] Let me take you on a trip, back to 1992 and the town of Nsukka in southern Nigeria, where an American professor named Jonathan Haynes was teaching film and literature on a Fulbright grant. [Jonathan Haynes] I was interested in African cinema and was fairly newly arrived in the country and learning what I could about Nigerian cinema, which had pretty much completely collapsed. [Rico