Official Trailer for Rungano Nyoni’s ‘On Becoming a Guinea Fowl’ Film
by Alex Billington
November 14, 2024
Source: YouTube
“Why are they mourning Uncle Fred like he’s some angel?” A24 has unveiled the official trailer for an indie film called On Becoming a Guinea Fowl, the second feature made by the acclaimed African filmmaker Rungano Nyoni who got her big break with I Am Not a Witch (from 2017). This new one premiered at the 2024 Cannes Film Festival earlier this year and has been playing at tons of other festivals throughout 2024. “Do you want me to dig up the corpse and ask it what happened?” On an empty road in the middle of the night, Shula stumbles across the body of her uncle. As funeral proceedings begin around them, she and her cousins bring to light the buried secrets of their middle-class Zambian family. It’s a story about a woman coming to realize how hard it is to challenge misogynistic traditions in a patriarchal society. The film stars Susan Chardy, Elizabeth Chisela, Henry B.J. Phiri, Roy Chisha, and Blessings Bhamjee. Reviews are mostly mixed, it’s not as good as her first film, but keep an eye out for this in art house theaters anyway.
Here’s the official trailer (+ poster) for Rungano Nyoni’s On Becoming a Guinea Fowl, from YouTube:
On an empty road in the middle of the night, Shula (Susan Chardy) stumbles across the body of her uncle. As funeral proceedings begin around them, she and her cousins bring to light the uncomfortable buried secrets of their middle-class Zambian family, in filmmaker Rungano Nyoni’s surreal & vibrant reckoning with the lies we tell ourselves. On Becoming a Guinea Fowl is written and directed by British-Zambian filmmaker Rungano Nyoni, her second feature film after directing I Am Not a Witch (2017) previously, and many other short films and projects. Produced by Tim Cole, Ed Guiney, and Andrew Lowe. This initially premiered at the 2024 Cannes Film Festival in the Un Certain Regard section. A24 will release Nyoni’s On Becoming a Guinea Fowl in select US theaters starting on March 7th, 2025 next year. Anyone intrigued?
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