MyWeku

Gone are the days when African films were exclusively shot on video using Betacam and Super cam. Gone are the days when the only films screened in most African countries tended to be either American or Indian.

These days locally made films by local film producers are the norm especially in the Nigerian film industry.

However, it is fair to surmise that the African film industry still has a long way to go: Hollywood has perhaps done more than most in entrenching a perception of America that cuts across continents. That perception alludes to wealth, reward for hard work and a sense of superiority that is not always successfully subdued. Tarzan, Virus, Blood Diamonds and others only serve to portray Africa in a one dimensional way that ignores the nuances and intricacies of African life.

The last two months has seen a plethora of attention given to African Films like Invictus and Skin. One of the advocates behind some of these successes is film maker Kisha Imani Cameron. Her mission has been to bring African Films to international screens around the world through Africa First, a company she founded in 2008. Kisha Cameron runs Africa First in partnership with Focus Features the distributors of films such as “Broke Back Mountain”, Catch a Fire” and “Atonement”.

The Africa First project was developed to promote and showcase African films and talent in the international arena. The project awards $10,000 to finance pre-production, through to production and post production to Directors of short films produced in Africa.

A few weeks ago we profiled three African films to look out for. Pumzi was one of those films we recommended. Pumzi (directed by the Kenyan Wanuri Kahiu) is also one of the films, incidentally all directed by females, to have been screened at the Sundance Film Festival recently. In total 3 of the 5 African Films selected and financed through the Africa First Award programme were screened at the Sundance Festival. The other two films are Dyana Gaye’s Ndar (Senegal) and Jenna Bass’ The Tunnel (South Africa).

Interest in the films have been good, not least because of the variety of films selected by African First. Pumzi is a Sc-fi Film, Ndar a musical and The Tunnel a drama.

Africa First’s work with African film producers is not altruistic, and rightly so. The award winners (Directors) retain the overall right to their films and the North American rights go to African First and Focus Features.

Beyond the efforts of Africa First and others, it is important to allude to some of the wider structural changes needed if African films are to compete effectively .Copy right laws need to be enacted and enforced, distribution and marketing improved and some finance made more accessible to budding film Directors. Niyi Epega a Nigerian Film maker hinted at this in a recent interview “Nigeria remains a very difficult place in which to conduct any business at all. I am absolutely amazed at my fellow Nigeria producers, and at how far the industry has progressed in its less than 20 years of existence. We just keep proving what our government and other so called leaders fail to realise. It is the plight of official stupidity that we keep bringing to the fore”.

As Africa First’s awards demonstrate, with a relatively small budget of ($10,000) good quality films can be produced to international standards by Africans in Africa.

 

It is evident that the consumer demand needed to make the industry commercially viable is already there. The Nigerian film industry enjoys plenty of that even though the movies churned out seem monotonous.

Studios equipped for 35mm are still a rarity on the continent. This may hinder film makers hoping to win awards on the international stage as international awards mostly do require films to have been shot in 35mm. However, the priority for film makers is to their audience first and foremost. Lack of the most sophisticated equipment, even though important, shouldn’t stop Directors from using the little that they have to project Africa on to world screens.

Nii Thompson