Mother of George is about an immigrant Nigerian newlywed couple who struggle between tradition and adjusting to life in US. I’m not sure how Mother of George got in my queue. First, Mother of George is set in NYC. Second, Mother of George stars the phenomenal and gorgeous Danai Gurira, everyone’s favorite sword wielder from The Walking Dead. Third, Mother of George has gotten some acclaim in the film community so maybe it made a list of top movies made in a certain category.
Mother of George is one of the most visually beautiful films that I have seen in my life. Some filmmakers do not know how to film black skin, but Andrew Dosunmu is a master of lighting. Every shot could be a photographic still in a museum or ripped out of the pages of Vogue. One early scene when the wife visits her husband at work lays out the entire story in a matter of seconds.
Mother of George presents a timeless human problem with only a few solutions. As the characters dismiss each solution, the resolution becomes painfully predictable, simple and messy for the omniscient audience, but not for the characters in the middle of the situation, which is the way that life is.
Mother of George is like watching a psychological horror movie. You will find yourself internally screaming at the characters not to do something. Mother of George brilliantly and credibly depicts a specific type of Nigerian immigrant experience in an incredibly American, metropolitan setting. Mother of George’s story is almost Biblical in the nature of the problem and how it predominantly focuses on the women’s navigation, submission and subversion of oppressive gender norms and how it dominates female identity.
S
P
O
I
L
E
R
S
Come on, husband and mother in law, wouldn’t it just have been easier for every one to just go to the fertility doctor?!? Mother in law, you can pressure your daughter in law and your younger son to do THAT, but not your older son to entertain the thought that working behind the stove cooked his little soldiers! Patriarchy is a powerful drug.