Africa Movie Academy Awards 2024: African film industry aims to become No.1 globally

On the night of the Africa Movie Academy Awards (AMAA), November 2, 2024 – the greatest night of the year for the African film industry – nearly half the audience was unable to hear perhaps the most important announcement in the 20-year history of the academy: The African film industry had aspirations of rising to number-one globally, with full government support and the needed financial support of the continent’s banking system, while surpassing both the USA’s Hollywood and India’s Bollywood in the quest for the global crown.

In celebrating the 20th Anniversary of the AMAA, most of the 2024 awards, sometimes called “the African Oscars,” had been presented as the third hour of the five-hour program began. The top prizes – best movie, best actress, best actor – were still awaiting dispensation. And then stepped forward one of the most pleasant and resplendent personalities to set foot onstage during the ceremony. 

Barrister Hannatu Musa Musawa, Nigeria’s Minister of Art, Culture, Tourism, and the Creative Economy, announced to the packed house at the elegant Balmoral Convention Center in Ikeja, Lagos, Nigeria, that for the first time in its history the Nigerian government was setting up a system of protection of intellectual property for artists, and one of the largest banks in the African Union had already established a $2 billion fund to support the African movie industry.

“Before now,” said Minister Musawa, “government has never been interested in performing or having a structure for the creative industry. It was not until our (current) President Bola Tinubu called me, gave me this portfolio, and said do something about the creative industry. This is the first time we’ve ever had a ministry to cater specifically to the creative industry.”

The keen-witted barrister/lawyer re-emphasized what some members of the audience were hearing for the first time in their careers.

“I’m working very hard on delivering – number one – policy regulation, IP, Intellectual property – that will be delivered to you next week. You deserve to have your work protected. You deserve to have the financing.

“We owe you a huge ton of gratitude for what you have done,” she said. “And I really hope that I can leverage this platform that we have to ensure that we give you the support that is needed to ensure that AMAA becomes the biggest film awards show in the world.” 

While the audience was still trying to figure out if they had heard the radiant and immaculately dressed arts and cultural minister correctly, another messenger with even more surprising news stepped to the podium to reinforce what was said only minutes before. 

MONEY PROMISED

Special guest presenter Novi Brown, who stars as Sabrina in Tyler Perry’s TV series “Sistas,” at one point felt it necessary to stop all action onstage and remind the noisy audience that a monumental development had taken place in their presence. She was accompanied onstage by investment bank representative Odi Ahanuva, as he prepared to reinforce the message delivered by the arts minister only minutes earlier, although what she said might have sounded too good to be true. He was about to drop another bombshell. 

“We are very clear about the opportunity that film offers the African continent,” the bank representative said. “You have been able to achieve so much with very little institutional support. We look at you and ask, ‘How far could Africa go if we give you the support, the capacity, the resources that your contemporaries in other parts of the world have? Your contemporaries in places like South Korea, places like China, places like India?’ So, the bank…is setting aside a total of $2 billion in support of Africa’s creative economy. That commitment was made by the president of Afreximbank about two weeks ago (on Oct. 15) in Algeria. The idea is that funding will enable us to build capacity, to build ecosystems, and enable film producers, musicians, and artists to compete, to put you on a level playing field with your contemporaries in other parts of the world. So, we look forward to collaborating with all of you, and especially using platforms like AMAA to build this industry up and allow it to see its full potential. We want you to be all that you can be. It will be a collective effort, and it won’t happen overnight. But I can assure you that Afreximbank has made that commitment, and we will do everything in our power to get you over the line.” 

Novi Brown, suspecting that the audience of creative minds and spirits still hadn’t fully understood what was being said, spoke up. “Two billion dollars,” she said as she leaned into the mike. “$2 billion. Yes, that’s what we’re doing. We’re funding filmmaking. That’s $2 billion people – two billion dollars.”

AFRICAN FILM ACADEMY

AFAA founder Peace Anyiam-Osigwe passed away on January 10, 2023. The annual awards began in 2005 as a component of the Africa Film Academy (AFC). The awards were devised as a sincere way of honoring and promoting excellence in the African movie industry as well as uniting the African continent through arts and culture. AMAA’s founding mother was also the president of the Association of Movie Producers (AMP). Her brother, Dr. Raymond Anyiam-Osigwe, succeeded her as designated President and CEO of the AMA.

The new President and his AMAA cohorts unveiled their plans and activities for the 2024 awards well ahead of the much-touted 20th Anniversary. They were determined to bring together as many African and Diaspora African film industry professionals in the film industry as possible. 

However, Shaibu Husseini, the head of AMAA’s College of Screeners, and Director General of the Nigeria Film and Video Censors Board, said, “The academy does not encourage films that don’t involve Africans or filmmakers of African descent.” 

AMAA 2024 – SELECT AWARDS

BEST DIASPORA NARRATIVE FEATURE – Outlaw Posse (USA)

BEST DIASPORA DOCUMENTARY – The Wu Tang Clan: Live at Red Rocks Amphitheatre (USA) 

BEST SHORT FILM – The Last Shoemaker (Uganda)

BEST ANIMATION – Counter Punch (Kenya) 

BEST DIASPORA SHORT FILM – The Neighborhood Alert (USA)

BEST DOCUMENTARY – The Night Still Smells of Gun Powder (Mozambique) 

ACHIEVEMENT IN CINEMATOGRAPHY – The Weekend

ACHIEVEMENT IN EDITING – Under the Hanging Tree

ACHIEVEMENT IN SCREENPLAY – The Weekend

BEST NIGERIAN FILM – The Weekend

BEST YOUNG/ PROMISING ACTOR – Michelle Lemuya (Nawi)

BEST ACTOR IN A SUPPORTING ROLE – Femi Adebayo (Jagun Jagun)

BEST ACTRESS IN A SUPPORTING ROLE – Elsie Chidera Abang (Kipkemboi)

BEST ACTRESS IN A LEADING ROLE – Jackie Appiah (Red Carpet)

BEST ACTOR IN A LEADING ROLE – Zolixa Xaluva (The Queenstown Kings)

BEST DEBUT FEATURE FILM BY A DIRECTOR – Letters to Goddo (Harry Bentil)

BEST DIRECTOR – Jahmil X.T Qubeka (The Queenstown Kings)

BEST FILM – The Weekend

CINEMA IN NIGERIA

Nigeria’s adaption to the needs and demands of the film industry began very early. Cinema in Nigeria is as old as the industry itself, dating back to the peep holes and shadowy productions first promoted by Thomas Edison in America (1895) and the Lumiere Brothers in France (1897). The first single-reel modern films were already available to a paying public in Lagos in August 1903 at about the same time that George Melies produced his “Voyage to the Moon” in Paris. 

The first films shown in Nigerian theatres were American and European. 

Geoffrey Barakas’ 1926 film “Palaver” was the first film to feature Nigerian actors in a speaking role. 

In 1935, a historic pan-Africanist breakthrough of a sort occurred with the filming of Zoltan Korda’s classic “Sanders of the River,” starring African Americans Paul Robeson and Nina Mae McKinney, and co-starring the very popular British Nigerian actor Orlando Martins.

The government-run Nigerian Film Unit displaced the Colonial Film Unit in 1949 as the Nigerian people demanded that their movies be “Africanized.” By 1965, the entire unit was under the management of native Nigerians. 

After independence in 1960, the movie business expanded tremendously, but the screens were constantly flooded by films from the USA, China, India, and Japan bringing in healthy revenues that were being shipped out of the country. 

 The Indigenization Decree of 1972 required the transfer ownership of more than 300 film theaters from foreign owners to Nigerians. 

By the mid-1980s, every Nigerian state had its own television broadcasting station. Interest in and attendance at the movies fell way off. Government regulations limited foreign content on television, so producers in Lagos began televising local popular theatre productions. Most Nigerian film producers had moved over to television production. 

“Project Nollywood” was launched in 2006 by the Nigerian Government, in conjunction with Ecobank to finance films of high quality and to fund a distribution network across the country. 

The “New Nigerian Cinema” began with the 2009 thriller film “The Figurine”. This film earned a lot of money at home in Nigeria, and it won some acclaim and received impressive income in overseas markets. 

 In 2014, the Nigerian film industry was worth $5.1 billion, making it the third most valuable film industry in the world, behind Hollywood in the USA and Bollywood in India. 

Another major achievement internationally occurred at the 2023 Sundance Film Festival, when Nigeria’s “Mami Wata” won the Special Jury Award for Cinematography.

AFRICAN AMERICAN INCLUSION

With the infusion of abundant amounts of new capital coming from both the government of Nigeria and the quasi-independent Afrinvestment Bank, there was some concern about whether there would be a proper place for African American filmmakers who have been working alongside their African brothers and sisters in the industry. 

Ayuko Babu, a co-founder of the Pan African Film and Arts Festival, sees no gulf existing between the current interest of native African and Diasporic African filmmakers, having been a member of AMAA’s jury for 19 of its first 20 years.

Babu points out that another three African Americans, besides himself, also serve on the 12-member jury. His spouse, PAFF co-founder and general manager Asantewa Olatunji; award-winning filmmaker and Vicksburg native Charles Burnett. Burnett is the 1988 winner of a MacArthur “Genius Grant” of $275,000. His film “Killer of Sheep” (1977) was selected as one of the second group of 25 films for the National Film Registry in the Library of Congress. Guyanese native June Giavanna, a curator of African films for Central and South America with a residence in London is also a member of the jury. “She came to our first PAFF festival representing England and Guyana,” Babu said. 

Babu says every Black filmmaker in Europe and America are a part of what is happening in the African film cosmography, especially what is happening in Nigeria. He said he spent the last five months in Nigeria. 

“This is the premier Black film event in the Black world,” he said. “The Nigerians make people respond because they’re doing something. The proof of this is that all those films from AMAA are on Netflix. That means that every Black filmmaker in Europe and America wants to hook up with the Nigerians. Cause they were able to get it all for themselves.” “It’s our moment. It’s our time,” says Babu. “There are some interesting filmmakers from Fiji in Nigeria now. They’ve been making films for 15 years, and they’ve decided to go and hook up with the Nigerians to make films now. 

“The organizers reiterated that AMAA is not a popularity contest but a professional contest that rewards professionalism across Africa and the Diaspora based on merit and best practices,” he says.

Dorothee Wenner, a German film curator and journalist, is the founding jury member of AMAA. Since 1990, she has served as curator at the Berlin International Film Festival.

PAFF COMING SOON

The 33rd edition of the Pan African Film and Art Festival will begin unfolding on February 4 and keeps revealing its savory contents through February 17, 2025.

PAFF will expand into Culver City while continuing its long-standing tradition at the Cinemark Baldwin Hills Crenshaw. This expansion reflects the festival’s incredible growth, increasing popularity, and unwavering community support. Mark your calendars – PAFF 2025 will take place February 4–17. Under the inspiring theme “Dream Beyond,” PAFF continues to amplify the vibrant stories of the Black diaspora through film, art, and cultural expression. This year’s expansion into Culver City marks a significant milestone, signaling the festival’s commitment to reaching new audiences, fostering cultural exchange, and creating more opportunities for artists and filmmakers to shine.

For over three decades, PAFF has been a cornerstone for celebrating Black excellence in film, visual art, and storytelling. The 2025 expansion allows the festival to further its mission while staying true to its roots.

More to come. 

For further information on schedules, tickets, content, please visit the online source at: paff.org.