DIRECTOR/SCREENPLAY: Julie Dash 
PRODUCER: Julie Dash, Arthur Jafa, Steven Jones
PHOTOGRAPHY: Arthur Jafa
EDITORS: Joseph Burton, Amy Carey
PRODUCTION DESIGNER: Kerry Marshall
COSTUME DESIGNER: Arline Burks Gant
MUSIC: John Barnes
WITH: Cora Lee Day (Nana Peazant), Alva Rogers (Eula Peazant), Barbarao (Yellow Mary), Trula Hoosier (Trula), Umar Abdurrahamn (Bilal Muhammad), Adisa Anderson (Eli Peazant), Kaycee Moore (Haagar Peazant), Bahni Turpin (Iona Peazant), Cheryl Lynn Bruce (Viola Peazant)

REVIEW

“Julie Dash’s majestic first feature is a poignant portrait of three generations of Gullah women (descendants of West African slaves) at the turn of the 20th century as their family struggle with the decision to migrate from their sea island home off the coast of South Carolina to the mainland. Daughters portrayed a new type of blackness and black identity – one located in a pastoral island setting still informed by myth and ancestral traditions. Dash’s perspective is determinedly feminist as she fuses together image, sound, authentic dialect and traditions of African oral storytelling to portray the power, beauty, and resilience of black women. Her vision and aesthetic sensibilities perfectly capture a forgotten moment of the African American experience and charts new ground in the representation of black women on screen. One of the key inspirations for the film work that accompanied Beyoncé’s Lemonade, this is a timely re-release for Dash’s powerful film.”

— Karen Alexander, London Film Festival 2017.

“Daughters of the Dust abounds with stunning motifs and tableaux, the iconography seemingly sourced from dreams as much as from history and folklore. But however seductive and trance-inducing, the visual splendor of Dash’s film is never vaporous.”

​— Melissa Anderson, Village Voice

FILM SOCIETY SCREENINGS

Nelson     
Tuesday 28 July, 6.00pm

Queenstown     
Tuesday 11 August, 8.15pm

Canterbury     
Monday 7 September, 7.30pm

Dunedin     
Wednesday 30 September, 7.30pm

Auckland     
Tuesday 27 October, 6.30pm

Hamilton     
Monday 9 November, 8.00pm

Whanganui     
Monday 16 November, 7.00pm

Wellington     
Monday 23 November, 6.15pm
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Tauranga     
Wednesday 2 December, 6.15pm
CLASSIC CINEMA selection >>