{"id":46650,"date":"2026-08-15T12:47:23","date_gmt":"2026-08-15T07:47:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/?p=46650"},"modified":"2026-08-15T12:47:23","modified_gmt":"2026-08-15T07:47:23","slug":"i-live-in-v-i-nigeria-class-satire-film-at-locarno-open-doors","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/?p=46650","title":{"rendered":"&#8216;I Live in V.I.,&#8217; Nigeria Class Satire Film at Locarno Open Doors"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><script>\r\n  atOptions = {\r\n    'key' : '644b717812d811d6a1c1fc5b6ccd6fa6',\r\n    'format' : 'iframe',\r\n    'height' : 90,\r\n    'width' : 728,\r\n    'params' : {}\r\n  };\r\n<\/script>\r\n<script src=\"https:\/\/www.highperformanceformat.com\/644b717812d811d6a1c1fc5b6ccd6fa6\/invoke.js\"><\/script>\r\n<br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div>\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/  a-font-body-m     \">\n\tAre you ready for <em>I Live in V.I.<\/em>, a social class satire from Nigeria? The project from director\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<br \/>Ugochukwu\u00a0Azuya was among the works-in-progress showcased at the 2026 edition of\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.hollywoodreporter.com\/movies\/movie-news\/locarno-open-doors-2026-producers-africa-film-projects-talk-1236659967\/\">Open Doors<\/a>, the\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.hollywoodreporter.com\/movies\/movie-news\/locarno-2026-preview-adventurous-films-algorithm-era-stars-1236652023\/\">Locarno Film Festival<\/a>\u2018s co-production platform and talent development program for filmmakers from equity-seeking communities and regions where artistic expression is at risk.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/  a-font-body-m     \">\n\tAzuya, whose short film <em>Swimming in Sea of Trauma<\/em>\u00a0was released in\u00a02023, is working on the movie with producer Olubunmi Ogunsola of Nigeria\u2019s Ensemble.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/  a-font-body-m     \">\n\tThe team behind the project, presented during the second edition of\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.hollywoodreporter.com\/t\/open-doors\/\">Open Doors<\/a>\u00a0with a focus on films from Africa, won the Tabakalera-San Sebastian Film Festival Residency Award.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/  a-font-body-m     \">\n\t<em>THR<\/em>\u00a0has compiled highlights about the movie and insight from Azuya about\u00a0the project\u00a0and the themes it explores.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/  a-font-body-m     \">\n\t<strong>Synopsis<\/strong><br \/>Florence (23) leaves her small town in Akwa Ibom for the big city of Lagos to start a new job in the hospitality industry, after the sudden loss of her father.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/  a-font-body-m     \">\n\tHowever, Lagos is not what it promised to be. From the poor living conditions of her apartment, the strenuous commute to Victoria Island (V.I.), insomnia and unprocessed grief, Florence begins to unravel. To cope with the demands of her job, she decides to squat in an abandoned construction site of a government building project from the 80s, much closer to her workplace.\u00a0Her sudden punctuality puzzles her co-workers. Florence\u00a0comes up with\u00a0a lie, one where she lives in V.I, a\u00a0neigborhood\u00a0strictly for the wealthy, with her once-famous now forgotten aunt. All this to sustain the illusion of \u2018living the good life\u2019 in Lagos.\u00a0With its\u00a0m\u00f6bius-strip-esque\u00a0structure, this surreal social class satire about grief, urban alienation and gentrification in the city of Lagos explores the lost hope of the Nigerian dream.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/  a-font-body-m     \">\n\t<strong>Director\u2019s note<br \/><\/strong>\u201cWe are all just a city.\u201d\u00a0Florence is a surrogate for\u00a0myself\u00a0and countless young people trying to make the most of their situations while dealing with survival in Lagos, Africa\u2019s most populous city. Just like us, she can be evasive about the emotions that make her vulnerable, constrained under capitalism. Like Florence, many leave their home states for Lagos in search of opportunity. <\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/  a-font-body-m     \">\n\tLagos is a city of fantasies where exorbitant displays of wealth exist alongside failing infrastructure and displaced people. With an ensemble of characters and dramatic situations that are colored with different aspects of the Nigerian collective psyche \u2013 our eccentricities, our bravado, the spirit of adapting to the\u00a0most dire\u00a0of situations with sheer ingenuity \u2013 the Nigerian sense of humor with its gleefully sardonic texture is what shapes this story. I want to\u00a0showcase\u00a0the poetry of the city: brutal, magical, chaotic. From Yaba to Oshodi,\u00a0Elegushi\u00a0to\u00a0Obalende, Ojo to Gbagada, we all form\u00a0a constellation.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/  a-font-body-m     \">\n\t<strong>What was the inspiration for you to want to make this film?<\/strong><br \/>My inspiration comes from my personal experiences as a young person. As someone who has lived in Lagos and experienced the mechanisms of life in this materialistically driven, very classist society. The story was also borne of my experience of other people I have crossed paths with, young people, mostly women who mirror the working-class background of the film\u2019s protagonist, Florence. <\/p>\n<p>I\u2019ve always been interested in the ways in which society is constructed and how this forms our psyche both as individuals and also as a collective, especially living under capitalism as we are. <em>I Live in V.I<\/em> explores how this manifests through various social strata, i.e class, gender, social background.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/  a-font-body-m     \">\n\t<strong>How universal are the themes of the film, and why should people outside Nigeria see it?<\/strong><br \/>I think anyone living anywhere in the world can understand what it is to leave their hometown for the promise of an urban cosmopolitan city in order to assert their identity and their hopes of changing their material conditions, whether the city is Lagos, Tokyo, S\u00e3o Paulo or New York City. <\/p>\n<p>Cities are unique milieus where millions live together at a peculiar rhythm which is intrinsic to the psyche of the city dweller. To an outsider who isn\u2019t used to this tempo, city life can feel overwhelming and a lack of human connection can lead to loneliness against this massive concrete backdrop.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/  a-font-body-m     \">\n\t<strong>What is the next step for you and your collaborators after Open Doors?<\/strong><br \/>Our focus as a film team at our production company Ensemble is to give the film the adequate development cycle it needs. The Tabakalera-San Sebastian Residency award, which we won at this year\u2019s edition of Open Doors, represents the direction we want to take development in, and we are honored to have been awarded such an opportunity.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<script async=\"async\" data-cfasync=\"false\" src=\"https:\/\/pl30214220.effectivecpmnetwork.com\/9ab3d4df8a7e1a6171e16ddbf732cc19\/invoke.js\"><\/script>\r\n<div id=\"container-9ab3d4df8a7e1a6171e16ddbf732cc19\"><\/div>\r\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Are you ready for I Live in V.I., a social class satire from Nigeria? The project from director\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Ugochukwu\u00a0Azuya was among the works-in-progress showcased at the 2026 edition of\u00a0Open Doors, the\u00a0Locarno Film Festival\u2018s co-production platform and talent development program for filmmakers from equity-seeking communities and regions where artistic expression is at risk. Azuya, whose short film&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":46651,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/www.hollywoodreporter.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/I-Live-in-V.I.-Locarno-Open-Doors.webp?w=960&h=540&crop=1","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-46650","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-pics-news"],"brizy_media":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46650","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=46650"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46650\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/46651"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=46650"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=46650"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=46650"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}