Germany Celebrates Nollywood at Filmfest

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The nation’s burgeoning film indus­try has witnessed a boost in far away Frankfurt, the commercial capital of Germany, as the nation’s Min­istry of Arts and Culture has welcomed and thrown its weight behind the idea of cementing the relationship between the Germans and Nigerians through film.

This is however coming under the auspices of a four-day long fiesta tagged: Nollywood Film Festival Germany, NFFG, being championed by avid cul­ture promoter, Isaac Izoya of Ehizoya Golden Entertainment, a filmmaking company based in Germany.

The event which comes up in Sep­tember, is scheduled to hold at Hessen’s Filmforun Höchst VHS, Frankfurt from 11th to 14th. Aside the coordinating com­pany, other organisations backing the event include: Hessen State Filmforum VHS – Frankfurt Am Main, Germany, The Office for Multicultural Affairs (AMKA – Germany), Millenium Hos­pitality International, Nigerian Asso­ciation Rhein/Main Area e.V Frankfurt, Germany, Sunday Exclusive Live, Nige­ria Television Authority NTA, Nolly­wood Radio France and Nollywood Spot­light – Houston.

The festival is packaged to create a platform that will facilitate an opportu­nity for Nigerian directors, actors, film distributors, producers and journal­ists to interact with their Europe coun­terparts about the nature and future of Nollywood and the movie industry generally as it will be both ‘a peda­gogic and stimulating platform for in­tercultural dialogue and international exposure’.

Some of the activities lined up at the event include: daily screening of some of the best productions form Nollywood, musical concert, a colloquium on the film industry in Nigeria as well as cel­ebration of some talents in the industry, who have brought honour to Nollywood in far-flung locations around the world. One of those penciled down to be cel­ebrated is Patience Ozokwor, the AMAA 2014 Best Supporting Actress, whose birthday incidentally falls on the second day of the festival. Other artistes who will grace the event are Olamide, Osita Iheme and Charles Inojie.

Explaining the inspiration behind the laudable project, Izoya said he was mo­tivated by an earlier resolve to change the perception of Germans about the African film industry. “There is actually one film festival that holds in Germany on African films but they hardly show films from Nollywood, which by all stan­dards is leading the African hub. During one of the festivals, they concentrated on films from the Francophone indus­tries of Africa. The films from there were mainly on wildlife which gave the Germans the impression that Africa was all about wildlife. So I swore that I was going to change that perception by put­ting together a film festival that would show Africa’s largest economy in posi­tive light. The Nollywood Film Festival; Germany is the result of that effort. Some Germans are shocked when they see well-built roads and good houses in Nollywood films. They would ask if that is actually Africa. So this festival which will hold annually is the begin­ning of that journey towards changing that ugly perception. We are lucky that the authorities in Germany and other outfits graciously bought into it, which is so good”.

Isaac Izoya, through the medium of Ehizoya Golden Entertainment, first es­tablished Nollywood’s active presence in Europe, when he started in 2002 through Nollywood film productions and promo­tion of stand-up comedy shows, music and cultural road shows across Europe. Recently, he relocated to Frankfurt due to the well documented supportive char­acter of the city of Frankfurt as well as popular demand by Africans, especially Nigeria immigrant populations in and around Hessen. Since Nollywood stars started storming Europe, Germany has played a major role in giving comfort and pleasure for the visiting stars from Nigeria and Ghana, making it to be de­scribed as “Home abroad” by a majority of the Nollywood stars who have visited Germany through Ehizoya Golden En­tertainment e.V.

The four days event will be crowned with NEGA Awards; (Nollywood E-Golden Awards), which will feature honours for selected film stakeholders from Nigeria, Ghana and in the Dias­pora who have played important roles in making Nollywood what it has become today.

Source: Nigeria – National Mirror Newspaper