Podcast

In this episode, journalist and film critic Leila Latif talks about her coup de coeur pick from a season of Arab women filmmakers at the Garden Cinema in London - Nadine Labaki’s Capernaum. We talk about the importance of the film, its sensitive and sober depiction of poverty, its positive reviews and those that called it overblown or manipulative, and what this says about Western stereotypes of the Arab world. We also talk about Sudanese film, Saleh Bakri’s always charismatic turns in Wajib (…)

In the spirit of shedding light on all the great (and not-so great), imaginative and impressive films being made by the independent sector the world over, I spoke to Jack Brindelli from Indy Film Library, a platform that supports and reviews independent, under-celebrated or little-known films. The Indy Film Library is now a member of the Independent Media Association and they have an online and live mini-fest coming up end of April. The live element will be in Amsterdam. Jack wanted to flag (…)

"A Lana Del Rey video as directed by the press manager for the Coalition for Families". Animator Nadia Barbu joins us for scathing review of Blonde. Nadia is an award winning animation filmmaker and illustrator. You can see her work here. *Trigger warning* We discuss the film’s depiction of abortion and miscarriage.

We were delighted to chat with Nana Mensah, director, writer and actress. Her first feature film Queen Of Glory, in which she also stars, met with much critical acclaim and was praised for its astute, unsentimental and at times downright hilarious portrayal of a Ghanian family in the US and high achieving academic daughter. We chat about her foray into filmmaking, how she made use of available resources, recent work by emerging filmmakers and artists of African origin(s) in and she shares (…)

"What unites these documentaries is that they both believe in a meritocracy" Summer break is officially over... In this episode, we discuss the problem of student debt in the US, the very specific ways it affects Black Americans and the elitism of higher education, through: The Intercept documentary Freedom Dreams: Black Women and the Student Debt Crisis, narrated by former Ohio state Sen. Nina Turner, a longtime ally of the growing debt abolition movement, which looks at the crippling (…)

More Q&As! As Coco Green gets stuck in the final chapters of her PhD, we take a break from our usual format to publish Q&As and whatever audio output we fancy. To mark our partnership with the Clermont-Ferrand International Film Festival and celebrate short films, we had a chat with Philip Ilson, founder and director of the London Short Film Festival, and film programmer (for the BFI London Film Festival, amongst others) . We talk about film clubs in the 1990s, the festival’s early (…)

We sent a bunch of questions to ambient music maestro Phondupe, who kindly recorded his answers. We thought we’d upload the audio as part of our podcast while we’re on a short break from our usual format! The written article is here.

We’re back!! We took a couple of months’ break for me to get over the chaos of the first few weeks of having a newborn (my second - still chaotic!). We’re delighted to have Akua Gyamfi join us this week to discuss her work and her top picks. Akua is the founder of The British Blacklist, as well as co-creator of The Circle, which is relevant to our discussion. 🎙️ mydy.link/podcast Support us: 💷 ko-fi.com/mydy Subscribe for offers at: mydy.link/subscribe 🎧 mydy.link/apple

We jumped straight into this week’s picks: Dave Chappelle’s Netflix show The Closer - we discuss the various contentious issues that had been raised, the concept of punching down - or up - , taking offence, who holds power and critiques of whiteness. Passing - Does Rebecca Hall’s adaptation live up to the book? We discuss casting choices, the American specificity of the phenomenon of passing and the director’s perspective on it. Support us: ko-fi.com/mydy Subscribe for offers (…)

After a couple of weeks’ break for LFF, we are joined by guest Eddy Durnan, a Mydy subscriber, supporter, and a film buff with a long-standing career in visual effects to talk about (the somewhat maligned) Malignant. A trip down memory lane brings up discussions around Dirty Dancing and Pretty Woman... Support us: 💷 ko-fi.com/mydy Subscribe for offers at: mydy.link/subscribe 🎧 mydy.link/apple