Producers: Ed Guiney, Andrew Lowe and Tim Cole Director: Rungano Nyoni Screenplay: Rungano Nyoni Cast: Susan Chardy, Elizabeth Chisela, Esther Singini, Henry B.J. Phiri, Norah Mwansa, Doris Naulapwa, Gillian Sakala, Carol Natasha Mwale, Loveness Nakwiza, Bwalya Chipampata, Roy Chisha, Blessings Bhamjee and Malita Mulenga Distributor: A24
Grade: A-
Quietly simmering rage, coupled with sad resignation, suffuses Rungano Nyoni’s brilliant film about a death in the family that unearths revelations of past abuse. But “On Becoming a Guinea Fowl” goes beyond domestic tragedy to indict an entire society that codifies gender inequality and fosters the mistreatment of women.
The setting in contemporary Zambia, where Shula (Susan Chardy), recently returned from abroad, is driving home still in the outfit she donned for a costume party—a puffy suit made from a what looks like an inflated garbage bag and a headdress made of a sparkling silver helmet and dark sunglasses. It makes her look like an alien, which she perhaps is.
Suddenly she’s taken aback and stops. She’s noticed a body in the road and goes out to inspect it. It’s her Uncle Fred (Roy Chisha), and after verifying that she goes back to the car and ponders. She phones her father (Henry B.J. Phiri), who’s partying and offers worthless promises to help—closing with a request for money. She’s visited by an apparition of her younger self (Blessings Bhamjee) and by her drunken cousin Nsansa (Elizabeth Chisela), who notes that Fred seems to have dropped dead after patronizing a nearby brothel. Then they call the police to collect the body, though a scarcity of cars will delay the process.
It’s revealed that Shula and Nsansa were both sexually abused by Fred as children, and so was their younger cousin Bupe (Esther Singini), a college student who attempts suicide after making a cellphone recording accusing him of having done so. This does not seem to come as a shock to anyone in the family.
Instead they concentrate on the necessities of the funeral, an event performed in a ritualistic form Nyoni depicts with almost agonizing precision. The work involved is, as seems the case with all effort required in the society, left to the women, who must prepare for the descent of the extended family by making the house of Shula’s mother (Doris Naulapwa) ready for the onslaught, bringing in mattresses for the women and hauling in the food necessary to feed the crowd. Naulapwa and those who play Shula’s aunts (Gillian Sakala, Carol Natasha Mwale, Loveness Nakwiza and Bwalya Chipampata) castigate her for failing to make an appropriate show of sadness over Fred’s demise. They also encourage her and her cousins to keep word of Fred’s abuse to themselves.
That culture of silence, along with a presumption of female submissiveness, is even more apparent among the men seated outside. One of the most scathing scenes in that regard comes when Shula’s trying desperately to search for Bupe, concerned she might harm herself. But she’s interrupted by “uncles” who quietly but firmly ask her to get food for them, going so far as to specify exactly what they want.
The treatment of Shula, Nsansa and Bupe is mild, however, compared to that afforded to Chichi (Norah Mwansa), Fred’s much younger widow, who arrives, crawling on the floor in the requisite fashion. Shula had already gone to Fred’s house to see her, and been appalled by the brood of children he left behind and the pleas of the widow’s grandmother (Malita Mulenga) for them all not to be tossed out of the place by the dead man’s family. Now Chichi is shunned and berated for not having cared properly for her husband, accused in effect of being responsible for his death. At a conference between the two families held as part of the funeral, Chichi tearfully describes Fred’s treatment of his family and his refusal to stop drinking and eat reasonably, but the dead man’s sisters are unmoved; and despite efforts by Chichi’s male relatives to make amends, Fred’s relatives insist that she should receive nothing from what must have been a meager estate.
What follows is a hallucinatory protest that links up with a recollection from Shula’s childhood about the unique role that the tiny guinea fowl has among native creatures in warning about predators in their midst. It’s a closing image that some may criticize as too heavy a metaphor, but it gives Nyoni’s rueful message about the land of her birth a particularly trenchant impact.
With dialogue that’s predominantly in Bemba but frequently shits into English, this is in every respect a remarkably powerful film, deeply moving yet with surprising shafts of dark humor. The performance by Chardy is exceptional in its nuance, and while Chisela and Singini have more limited scope, they too bring their traumatized characters to vivid life. The rest of the cast are utterly committed. So too are the technical crew, who under Nyoni’s inspired direction create an atmosphere that’s incredibly specific in its details yet somehow universal as well. The production design (Malin Lindholm) and costumes (Estelle Don Banda) bring an encompassing sense of place and David Gallego’s cinematography a feeling of claustrophobic intensity, while Nathan Nugent’s editing juggles the shifts from hyperrealism to surrealism dexterously and Lucrecia Dalt provides a spare, unobtrusive score.
Some will argue that Nyoni’s use of metaphor can be heavy-handed, but if that’s so, it’s a minor flaw. The year is young, but it’s a certainty that when it closes this extraordinary film about trauma suppressed by familial and societal demands will be among its best.