Coconut Head Generation (Alain Kassanda)
On Cinema
•
1h 29m
Directed by Alain Kassanda • Documentary • 2023 • 89 minutes
At Ibadan, Nigeria’s oldest university, a student association hosts a documentary screening and discussion group. In a country where dissent is frequently punished, this Thursday Film Series becomes a space for conversation and impassioned debate.
Organizers program films by the likes of John Akomfrah (Ghana/UK), Jean-Marie Teno (Mauritania), and Med Hondo (Cameroon). With the films as a starting point, the students hold compelling discussions on issues including corruption, gender roles, LGBTQ+ rights, colonialism, housing, and corruption. In between screenings, we get a taste of their daily lives at university, as they play soccer, eat instant noodles and joke around with each other.
But when nationwide protests against police brutality break out, students find themselves on the front lines of resistance — and the issues that occupied them take on a new urgency. Meanwhile, university life is far from carefree, with frequent blackouts, overcrowded conditions, and consequences for even the most benign actions to better their lives.
“Coconut head generation” is a term used by older generations to denigrate young Nigerians as brainless. As this film makes abundantly clear, they are anything but.
Up Next in On Cinema
-
Wim Wenders' Story of His Early Years
Directed by Marcel Wehn • Documentary • With Wim Wenders, Peter Handke, Robby Müller • 2007 • 96 minutes
In intimate conversations Wim Wenders talks about his sheltered upbringing in post-war Germany. The film follows him on a journey into the past that takes him to Paris, where he lived as a yo...
-
The Celluloid Bordello
Directed by Juliana Piccillo • Documentary • With Annie Sprinkle, Carol Leigh, David Henry Sterry • 2021 • 86 minutes
Since the dawn of cinema, sex workers have served as muses to movie-makers. From the early white slavery pictures like The Girl Who Went Astray from 1900 to countless dramas and ...
-
The Story of Film: A New Generation (...
Directed by Mark Cousins • Documentary • With Mark Cousins • 2022 • 167 minutes
A decade after The Story of Film: An Odyssey, an expansive and influential inquiry into the state of moviemaking in the 20th century, filmmaker Mark Cousins returns with an epic and hopeful tale of cinematic innovati...