In Review of KIKUYU LAND FILM

Kikuyu Land is a documentary about Kenya's historical land injustices and the ways they still shape life today. Set in the country's tea-growing highlands, the film follows three subjects who have each been touched, directly or indirectly, by the colonial land grab that dispossessed the Kikuyu people. For them, land is tied to identity, memory and belonging, which makes what was taken far more than property.

Co-directed by Nairobi journalist Bea Wangondu and filmmaker Andrew H. Brown, the film premiered in the World Cinema Documentary competition at the 2026 Sundance Film Festival. Wangondu appears on camera and drives the investigation, drawing on her own family history and the stories she grew up hearing, which ends up clashing with what she discovers in her investigations. Alongside her is Mr. Mungai, a local claimant who presses for justice over land taken from his family. The third thread is a young schoolboy growing up in the tea farms, whose story shows how this legacy is inherited by a new generation.

Together, they confront corruption, colonialism, sexual abuse and greed. The film shows how multinational corporate interests, government institutions and eager local collaborators collude to keep these old injustices alive, and it lays that system bare with rare clarity. Beautifully shot and noticeably urgent, Kikuyu Land reminds viewers that land injustice is not a closed chapter of history. It is an ongoing struggle over land, justice and the future.

Catch KIKUYU LAND on cinema this month long on selected screening outlets. Sta