Nigeria submitted a movie to the Oscars for consideration for the first time in 2019. The Nigerian Official Selection Committee (NOSC) submitted its second movie, Desmond Ovbiagele’s Boko Haram-inspired film, ‘The Milkmaid’ to the IFF Executive Committee on Tuesday, December 1, 2020.
Nigeria’s movie industry, Nollywood is the second-largest in the world, second to India’s Bollywood, in the volume of movies released per year. Reports say it makes over 1,500 films annually. Nigerian producers have been making movies since the early ‘50s. But Chris Obi Rapu, Okechukwu Ogunjiofor, and Cheif Kenneth Nnebue collaborated to create Nollywood’s ‘first’ film in 1992. Their film, ‘Living In Bondage’, is considered the start of Nollywood as we know it. Since 1992, the industry has grown and now generates over $1 billion in revenue yearly, according to Nairametrics.
Genevieve Nnaji’s ‘Lionheart’ was the first-ever Netflix original film to be produced in Nigeria and also the first film to be submitted to The Academy of Motion Picture, Arts and Sciences for an International Feature Film (IFF) nomination. Until 2020, the award category was formerly known as ‘Best Foreign Language Film’.
In 2020 alone, Netflix original pictures received 24 nominations at the Academy Awards. The streaming company scored its first ‘Best Foreign Language Film’ nomination in 2018 for Hungarian movie, ‘Body and Soul’.
However, ‘Lionheart’ never made it through. The IFF Executive Committee disqualified it for not having enough of the movie’s dialogue in an indigenous language. The movie was largely in English, with a few scenes in Pidgin-English and about 16% in Igbo.
Now, the NOSC, consisting of respected Nigerian filmmakers and critics, has submitted its second Nollywood film, ‘The Milkmaid’ to the IFF Executive Committee earlier this week.
Last year, there was a mix up about the rules and what the Oscars considered to constitute an international film. The NOSC was hard-pressed to make sure that such mistakes were not made this year. The rules for the Best International Film category clearly specify: ‘The recording of the original dialogue track as well as the completed picture must be predominantly in a language or languages other than English. Accurate, legible English-language subtitles are required.’
The NOSC’s decision to submit ‘The Milkmaid’ this year completely satisfies the requirements of the Academy of Motion Picture, Arts and Sciences International Feature Film category. The movie, written, produced and directed by Desmond Ovbiagele is primarily in the Hausa language. The film that was shot on location in Taraba State, North-East Nigeria, also features Fulfulde and Arabic dialogues, all languages spoken by Northern Nigerians.
‘The Milkmaid’ focuses on how the deadly insurgency situation in Sub-Saharan Africa, affects women and children. Drawing inspiration from the image at the back of the 10 Naira note, the film follows a young Fulani girl, who confronts religious extremism in her rural African community. She embarks on a quest to locate her kidnapped sister, even as she tries to recapture her lost past.
It stars popular Northern Nigerian actress, Maryam Booth, alongside Ibrahim Jammal, Anthonieta Kalunta, Gambo Usman Kona among others. The film also credits New Jersey-based-surgeon, Oluseun Sowemimo as Executive Producer.
The movie is from a smaller part of the broader Nollywood film industry established in Northern Nigeria and characterised by films made in Hausa, Kannywood. Even though Kannywood had its first commercially successful film, ‘Turmin Danya’ in 1990 and got its name in 1999 from a Hausa publisher, Shehu Sanusi Daneji, it never became as popular as its counterpart in the south. This is one of the biggest films out of that region in recent times and it is interesting that the NOSC picked it out of five other movies from the Southern region.
The Academy of Motion Picture, Arts and Sciences also specifies that the country’s official film body may nominate only one film for the ‘Best International Film’ category. This explains why the committee didn’t submit movies like ‘Sanitation Day’, ‘Voiceless’, ‘Oloture’, ‘Ibi’ (The Birth), and ‘Eyimofe’, which made it through the first vetting process. ‘The Milkmaid’ received the most votes from the 12-member Nigerian Official Selection Committee at the final vetting.
The head of the committee, Chineze Anyaene-Abonyi, says seven of the nine voting-NOSC members cast their vote for ‘The Milkmaid’. While, three of the NOSC members were considered ineligible to vote, due to their affiliation with some of the films in competition, like ‘Oloture’.
She added, ‘The Academy’s approved parameters had to be diligently followed to select the country’s entry without prejudice. And I must say that the Nigerian film industry is awakened to the internationally-acceptable requirements for film production, though there would always be room for improvement in order to increase our competitive outlook every year.’
While this is only Nigeria’s second submission, the whole country is rooting for ‘The Milkmaid’ and hoping that it will get a nomination. But the final selection of nominees is subject to further determination by the IFF Executive Committee, and all we can do is hope and pray.