Lady — Sundance Review

The opening frame of Olive Nwosu’s feature debut, Lady, is upside down—a visual choice that makes sense from both a literal and metaphorical standpoint. The next frame reveals two young girls, their heads hanging back over a jetty, so they are quite literally seeing the world upside down in that moment. Metaphorically speaking, it’s fitting to introduce Lagos to the audience with an upside-down image. It’s almost reminiscent of the iconic shot of the Statue of Liberty in The Brutalist (2024) that inverted the symbol of the American Dream. The more one seeks out international cinema, the more one recognizes the struggles that other countries face, and America is far from the only country where the dream of financial freedom and stability feels precarious and unattainable.