A trunk, forgotten films and my mother鈥檚 pioneering legacy
Following the death of her filmmaker mother Kathleen, Nina Collins kept her largely forgotten work locked in a trunk for years, but opening it helped Nina deal with her grief.
Nina Collins鈥� mother Kathleen is a giant of African American cinema, as one of the first female black American directors her work, in particular her film Losing Ground, is essential viewing for any student of the genre. However it wasn鈥檛 always like this, for years her films, plays and short stories languished in obscurity. It was only when her daughter Nina, poured her own money into publishing, restoring and showing her mother鈥檚 works that their significance was appreciated more widely.
Nina had a fraught relationship with her mother, a childhood marked by divorce, mental illness and violence. And Nina鈥檚 unsettled life in many ways mirrored her mother鈥檚. After her death Nina kept her mother鈥檚 papers locked away, it wasn鈥檛 until nearly 20 years later that she started to look through them, began to understand her mother better and build her legacy.
Presenter: Shahidha Bari
Producer: Julian Siddle
Get in touch: outlook@bbc.com or WhatsApp +44 330 678 2707
(Photo: Kathleen Collins and Ronald Gray on the set of Losing Ground. Credit: Courtesy of Milestone Films and Gary Bolling)
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