In My Father’s House

Writer/Director: Abbesi Akhamie
Producer: Melissa Adeyemo

Genre: Drama

In My Father’s House follows a young Nigerian-American woman as she confronts her pain and discovers a place of belonging in the homeland of her estranged father.

In My Father’s House follows Anna (nee Anike), a strong-willed independent woman, who arrives in Nigeria seeking ownership of her mother’s house from her estranged father, Shola. We meet Anna in her late 20s, still raw from the sudden loss of her mother, clinging to the family house she was raised in, back in the United States. Not having seen each other in over a decade, Anna’s arrival takes Shola by surprise and they are met with each other’s steely resolve. Shola is unwilling to release the property, forcing Anna to shamelessly pursue him. Their conflict reaches its breaking point when Anna shows up, uninvited, at Shola and his fiance’s engagement party. Anna’s eruption creates a spectacle and Shola is unreachable thereafter. Anna is at a loss on what to do next and has no choice but to seek her father’s chauffeur, Bode, for help. Having already been instructed to keep an eye on Anna, Bode reluctantly helps Anna to meet various people connected to Shola, creating a fuller picture of a man with a complicated past and uncertain future. With greater understanding of her father, her steely resolve begins to crack and when she finally discovers her father’s true whereabouts, she takes the trip to her father’s village alone where she faces him as he succumbs to his illness. Without many words exchanged, both of their truths are understood in their silence. With a now open heart, Anna accepts her newfound identity as Anike in her father’s homeland.