| April 10 proved a triumphant night for Nigeria at the sixth annual African Movie Academy Awards (AMAA). At a theater in Yenagoa, Bayelsa State, 53 countries competed for victory in 24 categories, but Nollywood came out swinging with The Figurine, which swept most of the major awards including Best Picture. With 10 nominations, the supernatural thriller directed by Kunle Afolayan won five trophies in total, more than any other film in competition.
This sweep by a Nigerian filmmaker was a shift from the previous year when Kenya dominated proceedings. The AMAA, an offshoot of the African Film Academy, is the largest award-giving body for cinematic achievement on the African continent and the annual ceremony is televised internationally. Like any film industry fête, the event is all glitz and glamor, complete with a red carpet, stars dressed to the nines and giddy fans.
Nigeria's own film industry, Nollywood, is the second largest in the world. Only India's Bollywood surpasses it in sheer number of productions churned out per year. According to UNESCO statistics, in 2006 alone, nearly 900 Nollywood films were released. By contrast, Hollywood releases for that year numbered below 500. Reasons for this gap come down to issues of time and money. Nollywood flicks tend to be shot on video (a cheaper medium than film), and are typically filmed, edited and distributed within the span of a month.
But when it comes to accolades, Nigeria's prolific track record is not always welcome. Much criticism has been lobbed at the AMAA for being too Nollywood-centric, and this year's ceremony may only add more fuel to the fire. Besides Afolayan's wins for The Figurine, Nigerians also took home awards for Best Screenplay (The Tenant) and achievements in art direction and editing, among others.
Other players are emerging, though. Ghana's film industry (otherwise known as "Gollywood") is on the rise and had a very good showing at the AMAA. Most notably, Ghanian filmmaker Shirley Frimpong Manso was named Best Director for her work on The Perfect Picture, a comedy about a marriage gone sour. What's more, her win points to a different strength of the AMAA and perhaps that of African film industry in general: a readiness to acknowledge women.
Women nominated for AMAA's sleek trophies aren't isolated to "female-friendly" categories for acting and costuming – Manso's win and her fellow directorial nominee, Leila Jewel Djansi for I Sing Of A Well, are proof of that. Last year, Best Director was awarded to a woman filmmaker as well, Kenyan auteur Wanuri Kahiu. Hollywood's own Oscars can't beat that two-for-two record: it took the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences over 80 years to finally recognize a woman director (this year's recipient, Kathryn Bigelow, for The Hurt Locker).
Kahiu's star has been on the rise since taking home a trophy for From A Whisper, her feature on the 1998 U.S. Embassy bombings in Nairobi and Dar es Salaam. Her follow-up film Pumzi was picked up by the distributor Focus Features as part of their Africa First program, and was subsequently screened at this year's Sundance Film Festival, the largest independent cinema film festival in the United States. Whether Manso will follow in similar footsteps remains to be seen. If anything is certain, it's that the African Movie Academy Awards attracts talent.
Getting Onto The Red Carpet
To apply for the AMAA:
Filmmakers interested in submitting to the AMAA for 2011's awards should visit http://www.ama-awards.com/ for nomination details. Both documentaries and narratives are welcome, as are short- and feature-length films.
To apply for Focus Features' Africa First program:
Every year, Focus Features' Africa First program awards five up-and-coming African filmmakers $10,000 each to help with pre-production, production or post-production of a short film. This year's application deadline is August 3, 2010. For more information, visit http://www.focusfeatures.com/africafirst/ | 
