Tunde Kelani (Photo by ADA DIKE) |
Tunde Kelani, a foremost cinematographer is the executive director of Mainframe Film and Television
Productions, an outfit he set up to document Nigeria's rich culture. In an interview with ADA DIKE, he about his career and issues affecting film production and marketing in Nigeria.
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Tunde Kelani joined
Western Nigeria Television (WNTV) in early 1970s and worked for 10 years in both Western
Nigeria Television (WNTV) and Nigeria Television Authority (NTA) in Lagos. He studied the Art and Technique of Film making at the London International
Film School, London. When he returned he did a lot of works for many
organisations including Reuters.
TK’s current project, Dazzling
Mirage was written by Dr. Olayinka Abimbola Egbokhare in the Department of
Communication and Language Art, the University of Ibadan. The film aims to
create awareness about sickle cell. He said: “I usually have a very strong
female character in my films. Dazzling Mirage is story about a lady who suffers
from sickle cell, against all odds; she managed to go through the pains and
trauma and managed to graduate from a university. Her father is a doctor and
her mother is a nurse who discovered that they are carriers of sickle cell and
decided not to have children.
“One day in their
hospital, a woman had a baby girl through operation but died and they didn’t know
her relatives. So they adopted the baby and take care of her. She has a crisis
and asks her parents to explain to her why they put her in such a situation
after all, they are educated and into medical field. So, they inform her that
they are actually not her biological parents, that she’s actually adopted. They
try to console her. The question is: would she make something out of her life?”
Furthermore, he said: “Sickle
cell predominantly, is a black man’s disease because it is a genetic disorder
and about 150,000 children are born with the disease every year. Also, 415
children are born every day with the disease. Its management is expensive and unreliable,
but, it can be prevented by simply going for a genotype test before marriage. If
you are not AA, you must make sure you do not marry an AS. The film aims to
create awareness about sickle cell,” Kelani said.
Also, one of his films, Ifa of the Yoruba
people of Nigeria, a 57-minute film which was shot in Oyo State tells a story
about Ifa literary corpus derived from a complex divining process, which is a
collective knowledge system of the Yorubas, combining their history,
philosophy, medicine, mythology, religion including performance poetry and
more. This documentary was done prior to the inscription of Ifa as worthy
representative list of intangible cultural heritage of humanity by the United
Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO). Kelani
revealed that Prof Wande Abimbola, Prof Akinwunmi Isola and Prof Ajuwon invited
him to provide the video documentary evidence of their academic work on the
subject matter. So the documentary created awareness on the importance of Ifa
and hopefully trigger a process of re-orientation into African values. In the
film, Ifa faithfuls frowned at the way Islamic and Christian religions have
wooed African s and they advised Africans to go back to their roots. The Ifa
aesthetic poems were highly rich and the film revealed that some Yoruba people
still patronise Ifa priest to get prediction about issues bothering them.
Some of TK’s16mm feature
films among others include Taxi Driver; Anikura, Ogun Ajay, Iya Ni Wura, Iwa
and Fopomoyo. He has produced many award-winning videos and they include: Ayo
Ni Mo Fe; Koseegbe, Ti Oluwa Nile and Oleku.
He also produced and directed two digital features, Saworoide and Thunderbolt. He shot Agogo-eewo on Dvcam
He also produced and directed two digital features, Saworoide and Thunderbolt. He shot Agogo-eewo on Dvcam
Others include: an M-net
short features films, Twins of the Rainforest, A Place Called Home and Barber's
Wisdom, The White Handkerchief, The Campus Queen Abeni, The Narrow Path, which
were his initial works using digital camera.
The veteran shot Efunsetan
Aniwura in 2005, The Narrow Path in 2007, Arugba in 2008 and Maami in 2011.
Having spent up to 40
years in film production, he has carved a niche for himself in the movie
industry. He encouraged other stakeholders not to relent in taking the industry
to a greater height, irrespective of the difficulties they are facing.
“We believe that this
industry is economically viable, that is why we are struggling to introduce
innovations to take it to the next level. I know that Lagos State Government
has a programme for us in terms of training and they planning to provide an
enabling environment for cinema and they are going to set up an endowment fund.
Also, the Federal Government has their plan including the $200 million
intervention fund President Goodluck Jonathan approved. So, there is hope for
the industry.”
Tunde Kelani (Photo by ADA DIKE) |
He suggested ways by which
film makers can ameliorate the impediment of advertising and marketing their
films. He believes that every movie production is problematic, especially when
you are making films in an unfriendly environment like Nigeria. However, he
noted that today’s producers have more opportunities than when they started
film production in Nigeria. “When we started, we did not have mobile phone,
internet, social media, You Tube and so on.
So today’s producer has a better avenues to position themselves in the
industry. They can advertise their films online and don’t have to wait for a
television station to advertise their products before their films would be sold.
Against the backdrop of myriads
of impediments that bedevilled recouping one’s investment in movie production, mobile
phone, internet and social media can be used to bring about positive changes.
Film making in Nigeria has
evolved over the years and its emergence can be traced from 1962 after the
establishment of television in Nigeria in Ibadan Oyo State.
As time went on, foreign movies (Chinese, Indians and others) dominated the market. But, Kenneth Nnebue’s ‘Living in Bondage’ produced in 1992 done in VHS contributed immensely to the emergence of what is known today as Nollywood.
Prior to this period, films produced by veterans like Eddy Ugbomah and Hubert Ogunde were mostly for cinemas. Along the line, many Nigerians became reluctant to go to cinemas and resorted to watching movies at the comfort of their homes. Within a space of few years, Nollywwod became the third largest film industry in the world after Hollywood of The United States of America and Bollywood of India.
But, marketing has
continued to be the main challenge for film producers. That is why many of them
recently resorted to producing films to be first shown at cinemas before
selling them on video compact disc (VCD).
However, at a recent event
where some stakeholders in the movie industry spoke extensively about myriads
of problems affecting Nollywood and suggested ways to tackle those problems, Mammud
Alli-Balogun was of the opinion that “Distributors are not here. Meanwhile, we
have digital video disc (DVD) and video compact disc (VCD) markets in Nigeria
because people hardly go to cinema. We need to re-jig and retrace our steps.”
Also, Hope Okpara
suggested that the issue of piracy must be dealt with for a movie producer to
make profit from his work. Other speakers including Francis Onuchi and Charles
Novia said that there is need for more cinemas in Nigeria, including cottage
cinemas.
Tunde Kelani Photo by (ADA DIKE) |
TK, as he is fondly
called, is of the opinion that film production in Nigeria is being threatened
by high cost of production, so none of film producers could recoup their
investment couple with the menace of piracy. “Nigeria today has one film to
three million people as against one film to 8000 people in the United States of
America. There are over 13,000
screenings in India where about 15 million people watch films at cinemas every
day, while South Africa has about 761 screenings. I see nothing stopping
Nigeria from having up to 5,000 screenings. So it shows that, although,
Nollywood is the second largest film producers in the world, we are facing a
lot of challenges in terms of production. Individually, we are striving to move
the industry forward, but government should create enabling environment for the
industry.
“Government must provide
security and electricity. Individually, we procured generator sets; we now
drink sachet water while some people dig well or put boreholes in their homes.
Government has to enforce the law to protect the industry, lives and property.
“Although, I have not
released any movie for years, we have not given up so, we have many projects
lined up,” Kelani said.
He advised the upcoming
film producers to be passionate about their jobs because the road is not easy
but tough so only the focused and determined ones can succeed.
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