B FOR BOY Breakthrough

Director Chika Anadu’s remarkable debut feature is a scathing critique of Nigeria’s patriarchal social order. Her protagonist, Amaka, maintains a happy marriage, raises a 7 year old daughter and runs her own successful business, yet her failure to produce a son for her husband makes her a target of derision among family, friends and neighbors. Anadu pays special attention to the illogical way the women in Amaka’s life are the most forceful proponents of a male-dominated idea of family, even pressuring Amaka to allow her husband a second wife. When Amaka’s latest pregnancy ends unexpectedly in a miscarriage, she takes extreme measures to keep the hope of a male heir alive. Lead actress Uche Nwadili creates a gripping portrait of a poised, confident woman sinking further and further into a tangled nightmare as she desperately tries to hold onto the life she’s spent 40 years building.