Nigeria Films and the Image of Nigeria

For many years, the image of Nigeria has been a soiled one. The people are misunderstood, and the image stands firm. The image has been built throughout the years, and culture and history has combined as powerful forces to form the image of Nigeria. The rest of the world thinks of this country as poor, illiterate, and slow in advancement. 

This is unfortunate because this image is mainly formed by stereotypical perceptions of the population in the country. In other words, it’s due to a lack of understanding for the people residing in Nigeria. People outside of this country do not truly understand the culture, and this leads to misconceptions. The people of this country understand that it’s going to take a lot of time and resources to help reshape the image that has taken root throughout the years. For this reason, they turn to popular culture – educating through movies and films.

Films are one of the fastest way to communicate important messages across the globe. Because they are created to entertain, they often attract huge crowds. A well made, award winning film can attract a lot of attention from the media. They are showcased in film festivals, and people from other nations can exchange ideas and appreciate the works of others. Through this manner, perceptions of each and every culture starts to change. From the films, there is an exchange of information – information about one culture with another. 

Such information is conveyed through films in two different manners – the graphic images, and the music. Music, as everyone knows, is universal. By listening to the sounds in the films, the audience gets a good understanding of the feelings of the characters within the film. Thus, in a non-verbal manner, they are able to understand the emotions of the people belonging to a certain culture. 

Graphic images are more straight forward. They convey messages of what is appropriate and what is inappropriate. Nigerian films are starting to portray the lives of the young living in their country. Such films provide insight as to what is happening within the country. The cities are starting to flourish, and many of the young and able are moving into the cities for a higher quality of life. The lives of these young people provide rich content for the films. 

The movies show that Nigeria is no longer a country that is lacking behind, and slow in advancing. Due to the evolution of technology, the young has become more and more tech savvy. Harnessing the power of technology, many has been able to make progress in leaps and bounds with their careers. It is a sure sign that the country is thriving.

The active movie industry is another indication that the country is doing well. More and more talented artists are coming forward to become directors, actors and actresses. Armed with great story lines, they have been known to shoot high quality movies even with a limited budget. It just shows how resourceful and creative the young citizens of Nigeria can be. The future looks brighter than ever. 

Adetola Banbe is the owner of a site that deals in Nigeria Movies and Nigeria Films website.

Yoruba Movies - The Growing popularity of West African Yoruba Movies

The Rise of West African Movies and Popularity 

What makes African movies and especially Yoruba Movies as well as Nollywood movies so popular is the story. Nigerian Yoruba Movies are very popular outside of Africa in countries in Western Europe as well as the US and the Caribbean. African movies are now making headlines and moves beyond its origin continent and are growing in popularity daily.

Nollywood is currently just behind Hollywood and Bollywood as the biggest movie distributors in the world. African movies are gaining attention worldwide with films from Western African countries such as Ghana and Nigeria being sold alongside Hollywood’s finest productions. Anyone who does not appreciate these movies if missing out on great African movie culture.

In African it is in the daytime that Yoruba Movies are at their most popular as they are preferred by a more female audience. They are now earning International attention despite the majority of these movies taking and comedic theme and their somewhat low production in comparison with movies you may find in Hollywood. Most of Africa’s movies are formed in Nigeria and Yoruba Movies are amongst the most popular. Not only did they spread beyond Western African the Africa as a whole but they have spread worldwide. Nigeria, Togo and Ghana lead the charge in the popularity of African movies. In one of only a handful of cinemas in Nigeria, a cinema in Lagos screen Yoruba Movies alongside Hollywood blockbusters.

Fox Series 24 Officially Cancelled

FOX has just announced that 24 is officially canceled and that this current season will be its final season. The season finale will air as a special two hour episode on Monday, May 24 2010 (8:00-10:00 PM ET/PT).

PRESS RELEASE

In a joint decision made by 24's star and executive producer Kiefer Sutherland, executive producer and showrunner Howard Gordon, Twentieth Century Fox Television, Imagine Entertainment and Fox Broadcasting Company, it was determined that the acclaimed series will end its remarkable eight-season run. Jack Bauer's last day on FOX will conclude when the final two hours of "Day Eight" air Monday, May 24 (8:00-10:00 PM ET/PT). As the countdown to the series' climactic conclusion races on, the final 11 hours will air uninterrupted Mondays (9:00-10:00 PM ET/PT) on FOX.

Multiple award-winning series star Kiefer Sutherland reflected on the show's run: "This has been the role of a lifetime, and I will never be able to fully express my appreciation to everyone who made it possible. While the end of the series is bittersweet, we always wanted 24 to finish on a high note, so the decision to make the eighth season our last was one we all agreed upon. This feels like the culmination of all our efforts from the writers to the actors to our fantastic crew and everyone at Fox. Looking ahead to the future, Howard Gordon and I are excited about the opportunity to create the feature film version of 24. But when all is said and done, it is the loyal worldwide fan base that made it possible for me to have the experience of playing the role of Jack Bauer, and for that I am eternally grateful."

Executive producer and showrunner Howard Gordon said, "Kiefer and I have loved every minute of making 24, but we all believe that now is the right time to call it a day. I echo his sentiments of gratitude toward the show's amazing creative team, as well as the studio and network who have always believed in us and shown us unbelievable support."

"24 is so much more than just a TV show - it has redefined the drama genre and created one of the most admired action icons in television history," said Peter Rice, Chairman, Entertainment, Fox Networks Group. Kevin Reilly, President, Entertainment, Fox Broadcasting Company added, "We are extremely proud of this groundbreaking series and will be forever thankful to Kiefer, the producers, the cast and crew for everything they've put into 24 over the years. It's truly been an amazing and unforgettable eight days."

"We are so grateful to Kiefer and Howard who have really poured their hearts and souls into making this show over the past eight seasons," commented Gary Newman and Dana Walden, Chairmen, Twentieth Century Fox Television. "To everyone who contributed to this iconic series over its amazing run, we want to extend our heartfelt appreciation for your incredible work."

Added Imagine Entertainment's Brian Grazer, "I'm so proud to have been a part of 24, which has become such a cultural phenomenon. And to Kiefer and Howard and everyone who has worked on the show, many thanks."

Now in its eighth season with Kiefer Sutherland starring as the heroic Jack Bauer, the inventive and suspenseful 24 has been nominated for a total of 68 Emmy Awards, winning for Outstanding Drama Series in 2006. Over the course of seven seasons, Sutherland garnered seven Emmy nominations and one win for Outstanding Lead Actor - Drama Series. While the series gained global recognition, Sutherland's portrayal of the legendary character penetrated the American psyche like no other dramatic television character to become part of the English lexicon.

Premiering November 6, 2001, 24 employed a pioneering split-screen, fast-paced format with complex interweaving storylines as viewers followed anti-terrorism agent Jack Bauer through 24 pulse-pounding episodes, each covering one hour and presented in real time. Subsequent seasons combined the show's unique and trend-setting format while delivering compelling new elements and attracting talented actors and guest stars, including the Emmy Award-winning Cherry Jones (President Allison Taylor). The series also currently stars Mary Lynn Rajskub (Chloe O'Brian), Anil Kapoor (Omar Hassan), Annie Wersching (Renee Walker), Katee Sackhoff (Dana Walsh), Mykelti Williamson (Brian Hastings), Freddie Prinze Jr. (Cole Ortiz), Chris Diamantopoulos (Rob Weiss) and John Boyd (Arlo Glass).

The first six seasons were set in Los Angeles, and following the strike-induced delay of Season Seven, "24: Redemption," a two-hour film bridging Seasons Six and Seven, was set in Africa. Washington , D.C. was the setting for Season Seven, and the final season of 24 finds Jack Bauer thwarting a terrorist attack in New York .

At the conclusion of Season Eight, 24 will have a produced a total of 194 episodes (including "24: Redemption"), making it one of the longest-running action television shows in history.

Tune in Monday, March 29 (9:00-10:00 PM ET/PT) for the next all-new installment of 24 and Monday, April 5 (8:00-10:00 PM ET/PT) for a special two-hour episode.

Created by Joel Surnow and Robert Cochran, 24 is a production of 20th Century Fox Television and Imagine Television in association with Teakwood Lane Productions. Howard Gordon, Evan Katz, David Fury, Manny Coto, Brannon Braga, Brad Turner, Alex Gansa, Kiefer Sutherland and Brian Grazer are executive producers, while Chip Johannessen and Patrick Harbinson serve as co-executive producers. Brad Turner will direct the series finale.

Sandra Bullock heads home for divorce shoot-out with Jesse James

Now that Jesse James' alleged mistress count is up to four, a source close to Sandra Bullock told Popeater that the actress has come back to California (after going into hiding in Texas) so she can set her divorce in motion.

"It's over," the friend told gossip website Popeater. "After everything that has happened, it is impossible for them to get back together, even though I'm sure she still loves the man she thought he was."

According to Radar Online, the recent Oscar winner has moved back into the Hollywood Hills mansion she lived in before her marriage.

"Sandra has returned home to face the problem head-on. She isn't the sort of woman to bury her head in the sand and hope everything will go away," another Bullock insider said. "As painful as this is going to be, expect Sandra to cut out the cancer very soon."

Meanwhile, the father of alleged mistress No. 1, Michelle McGee, is defending her choice in men, telling Us Weekly that his daughter believed James and Bullock were separated.

"(James said), 'They have a thing now where they kind of live apart and she's on the scene for movies in stuff, and I'm here in San Diego,'" Denny McGee told Us Weekly, adding that his daughter only found out the truth when she saw the couple together at the Academy Awards. "She was under the impression they weren't seeing each other. She felt like she was going to have a relationship and this happened and she was mad."

Mad enough to seek a $30,000 US payday for her story, apparently. But aside from that, and despite those pesky Nazi-themed photographs, Denny insists his daughter is neither anti-Semitic nor a homewrecker.

"She's always been a great kid and a good mom to her kids. She's just a little bit different with the tattoos and stuff," he said. "The truth of the matter is, going into this whole thing with Jesse James, Michelle was single, and she was under the assumption that Jesse was single. As far as I'm concerned, they were two single people going out with each other, and there's nothing wrong with that."

From: The Vancuver Sun

Gadhafi: Nigeria should split along ethnic lines

Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi suggested Monday that Nigeria be split along ethnic lines, like Yugoslavia, into several mini-states as a way of resolving violence in Africa's most populous nation.

Gadhafi drew Nigeria's anger last week by saying the oil-rich nation should be divided into Muslim and Christian nations along the model of the 1947 partitioning of the Indian subcontinent, which led to the independence of India and Pakistan.

In those comments, he told a group of African student leaders in Tripoli that the violence in Nigeria was symptomatic of a "deep-rooted conflict of a religious nature" and required a radical solution.

On Monday, Gadhafi said that wasn't radical enough.

"Actually, the problem of Nigeria won't be solved by dividing it into two Muslim and Christian states. There are other people who, regardless of their religion, also demand independence," Libya's official JANA news agency quoted Gadhafi as saying.

"Therefore, what fits Nigeria in this case is Yugoslavia," he said.

From: AP News

Nigerian Senate vets cabinet nominees

Nigeria's Senate on Monday started screening potential ministers picked by Acting President Goodluck Jonathan who recently sacked an entire cabinet in a move seen to signal his quest for change.

Senate speaker David Mark read out five more names adding to the first list of 33 he submitted by Jonathan last week.

The Senate was planning to comb through a partial list of 14 nominees out of 38 sent in following months of political paralysis in the African oil giant, according to an official Senate agenda.

The exercise is expected to last several days.

I hope they come up with something good for us all...

Everyone wants to smell like Beyonce

Beyonce Knowles at the groundbreaking ceremony for The Barclays Center at Atlantic Yards in New York 

Incredibly, Beyonce's new perfume "Heat" is not a miserable failure. It's had sales of $3 million+ since it's launch last month. From Yahoo!:

Singer Beyonce Knowles has had a whiff of the sweet smell of success - $3 million worth of her Beyonce Heat fragrance has been sold since its launch last month.

The perfume hit the US departmental store Macy's in Feburary. Contactmusic.com reports that fans clamored to purchase the fragrance, which features 'notes of red vanilla orchid, magnolia, neroli and blush peach', and it quickly became America's top-selling beauty counter product.

The fragrance's popularity continues to soar - Macy's CEO Terry Lungren has revealed sales have reached a staggering $3 million in its first few weeks of release.

Celebrity perfumes have to be the dumbest thing out there. Neroli? What the fuck is neroli? Beyonce can't even spell neroli. She didn't develop this. You really want to smell like Beyonce? Fill a kiddie pool with $50k or so in large bills. And then just roll around in it. Or if you want to smell like Lindsay Lohan, fill that same kiddie pool with unpaid credit card bills and "past due" notices.

From: Celebslam

Sandra Bullock says she wouldn't have spared Tiger Woods

New York, March 27 (IANS) This year's Oscar-winning actress Sandra Bullock, who walked out on husband Jesse James two weeks ago after his philandering ways came to light, says she would have given Tiger Woods a tough time if she were in his wife's place.

The remarks by the 45-year-old actress were made in January - much before she won the Oscar and her husband's infidelities came to light - to 'The Insider' magazine at People's Choice Awards but revealed this week.

In the audio Bullock says that had she been in the place of Tiger Woods' wife she would have not stopped using the golf club against the philandering golfer.

Woods' wife Elin Nordegren had reportedly hit him with a golf club on the night he crashed his car into a fire hydrant outside their Florida home in November. The accident led to revelations about his multiple affairs.

"If I were Elin... man, I would have hit a lot more than she did... I would have kept hitting!

"Yeah, she (Elin) stopped. She was respectable. I'd get the baseball bat.

I'd get everything out.''

Bullock had no clues about her own husband's infidelities when she made these remarks.

Her marital life collapsed immediately after her Oscar victory, with porn star Michelle McGee claiming that she had an 11-month affair with Bullock's husband Jesse James.

After the porn star's claim, three more mistresses, including a stripper and a fetish model, have claimed sex with Jesse James.

"She's devastated. She's beyond upset. And she has every right to be. She was on top of the world with her Oscar victory and now this. It's such a difficult thing to deal with,'' reported radaronline Friday.

"She (Bullock) has a tight circle of friends. They won't say much about her. They want to protect her. And that's because she's been nice to everyone along the way. She's not stuck up. She doesn't act like a star. She acts like a normal, sweet person, which is exactly what she is. And that's why everyone is so loyal to her,'' the celebrity website says. 

From: Indian Times

US Commends President Goodluck Jonathan

*Says he has consolidated grip on power

*Believes Yar’Adua’s men won’t engineer political come back

Acting President Goodluck Jonathan’s consolidation of his grip on power is drawing applause from the United States of America which says his efforts are easing a political crisis that once fanned fears of instability in the country.

Assistant Secretary of State Johnnie Carson said Washington was encouraged that Jonathan was moving on electoral reforms, anti-corruption efforts and peace outreach in the restive Niger Delta, the centre of Nigeria’s largest energy industry.

“I think he’s done a very good job of consolidating his authority and reassuring all segments of the community,” Carson, the Obama administration’s top diplomat for Africa, told Reuters in an interview.

Hollywood and Bollywood join arms to fight piracy

Hollywood and Bollywood linked arms Thursday to fight piracy, with the announcement of a coalition among the Motion Picture Association of America and seven Indian companies to tackle counterfeiting in one of the world's largest film markets.

 

The alliance comes as Hollywood tries to tap global markets more aggressively and as Indian movie studios grow in size and stature — narrowing the gap between Indian and U.S. filmmakers, who have not always seen eye-to-eye on intellectual property issues.

A year in the making, the coalition to fight film piracy in India will work with movie theaters to crack down on camcorder piracy — the source of 90 percent of all pirated DVDs — with police to tighten enforcement, with Internet service providers to fight Internet piracy and with politicians to create more effective laws.

Jaden Smith features in "New Karate Kid"

Will and Jada Pinkett Smith's family is getting crowded with action heroes now that their 12-year-old son, Jaden, is beating up on bad guys.

Jaden Smith stars in the title role of "The Karate Kid," a remake of the 1984 hit in which he plays an American youth in China who gets a crash course in martial arts from a maintenance man (Jackie Chan) so he can defend himself against a band of bullies.

The movie, due in theaters June 11, screened Wednesday for theater owners attending their annual ShoWest convention, where Smith received an award as breakthrough male star of the year.

Jesse James vs Michelle "Bombshell" McGee

Earlier this week Sandra Bullock left her home aparently due to an alledged sexual affair between her husband Jesse James and Michelle McGee. McGee is a tattoo model from San Diego who declared that she has been

My romance with Dbanj is a private affair - Genevieve Nnaji

Genevieve Nnaji "I can only say that I would like to keep my private life private and I really don't have anything to say"But if one part of a couple reveals that he is going out with someone as high profile as yourself, it makes the story credible if you can actually confirm this...Genevieve "Dbanj is an adult and he has said something. Let's just leave it at that..."

Nigerian Breweries Plc pitches stars @ GUS celebrity showdown

Nollywood star actor, Bob-Manuel Udokwu was not surprised last Friday when  fate pitching him with actress Genevieve Nnaji as host of the maiden edition of the popular reality and celebrity show, Gulder Ultimate Celebrity Search, sponsored by Nigerian Breweries Plc.

This show, which makes its debut this year, according to officials of the brewing company,  will however not replace the front line show, Gulder Ultimate Search. The original GUS show made its debut seven years and will resume later this year.

Udokwu is the three  times host of the widely televised reality show. He will be in the jungle with the other nine celebrities searching for the lost treasure in this edition of the Gulder Ultimate Search Celebrities.

He was once a leader who will now be led by another of his own, Genevieve Nnaji. “My legs are wobbling, the leader will now be led,”Udokwu muted as he realised that he was going to join the likes of Daddy Showkey,  Emeka Ike, Funke Akindele, Chioma Chukwuka, Muma Gee, Dare Art Alade, Weird MC and fuji musician, Obesere to  climb  trees, mountains  and ropes in search of the hidden object.

There’s no doubt Udokwu has advantage over other celebrities as a former host of the yearly show. But in the jungle,  he will have the likes of  Daddy Shwokey, Emeka Ike, Obesere and perhaps, Dare Art Alade to outwit.

However, one thing will set the reality show apart from the regular one. The celebrities will all take a sign_on_fee to participate and each will get eviction fee based on when evicted.

Showtime  learnt that activities in the house will also include the regular physical work and a bit of intellectual exercise will also be introduced to make it more exciting. Shooting commenced last Friday and the programme will go on air any moment from now.

Running on AIT, NTA network, STV, Africa Magic, Soundcity (DSTV) and other stations as an original Nigerian adventure programme with international standard, the audience will be treated to an 11 week- show of talents, fame and excitement.

From: Vanguard Nigeria