NOLLYWOOD

A BRIEF OVERVIEW OF THE LOCAL INDUSTRY

The local movie industry in Nigeria otherwise known as Nollywood had been in existence for some two decades now, although she got her name some few years back but had been in business for a very long time, long enough to be a full grown business with huge success both nationally and internationally considering that the world today is a Global village with the invention of Information Technology.  But many wonder why progress in Nollywood had been like the movement of a crawling tortoise or probably stalled even when situated in a country highly populated with over 146 million people which in a real sense is a concrete market for massive development in the industry.

Since the inception of the industry, she had been able to attain a market potential relative to the size of the Nigerian economy of over N552 Billion naira according to marketing expert, Leke Alder yet she produces little less than a thousand movies in a year, her movies is been watched by an estimated 180 million people world wide but only via the help of DSTV and other satellite networks. Though rated among the first three International Movie Industries in the world but, since her inception had never risen above 200,000 copies of sales per movie. After twenty years of operation, the industry still suffers many set backs such as poor picture quality and sound, Un-intriguing effecting which most times is not needed, Microscopic budgeting which obviously is a failed finance for filmmaking, poor interpretation of characters by actors and above all, her inability to produce Screen writers and Directors whom are extremely Professional to the core. These set backs which are few among the many is a SHAME to all Movie practitioners in a great country such as Nigeria and must be corrected because filmmaking in a real sense isn’t what Nollywood presently is practicing but rather what is called Nollywood movies today in this world is just a bunch of stage dramas recorded with an available camera and dubbed into multiple compact discs then distributed to a market filled with an even smart and knowledgeable citizens of the world hence the failure in terms of returns.

If Nollywood must succeed in redefining herself as a world class movie industry not in mere praises rendered by a few unprofessional individuals obviously exhibiting a castrated ideology of filmmaking but in a substantial way evident for all to see both from her production stages to the distribution level where her products begins to yield returns via marketing then special attention must be paid to what I term as the Four P’s of success in filmmaking {Preproduction, Production, Post Production and Promotions}see details in Samuel Aaron’s Business Guide in Filmmaking.

What Nollywood really needs is not a film village highly sought for from the government over the years but a self evaluation of her products employing scrutiny in all areas of production which in one word can be said to be “Professionalism”. Once this is done, investors would start queuing up with their own proposals seeking to be a part of the next Nollywood’s movie and Screen writers, Directors, Actors and Actresses, Cinematographers, lighting technicians e.t.c. from the industry would then make the nominations for and possibly pick up the Oscars which is an Award of Excellence in Filmmaking.