The Subjectivity of Perspective

The Power of Film

"[Movie characters'] ideas become our ideas. Their thoughts become standards of our thinking and language. Their style of dress and movement are seen on the streets of our nation. And their moments of triumph and defeat become our successes and our failures."

Jodie Foster, as quoted in Movie Nights

The Global and the Transnational in Nollywood

"Nollywood, the Nigerian video film industry, has become the most visible form of cultural machine
on the African continent. It emerged before our very eyes, in our time. Beginning life is an uncharacteristic manner in Nigeria about twenty years ago, Nollywood has become a truly pan-African affairs...

"Shot on video, edited on personal computers, and copied onto cassettes and discs, Nigerian video films travel the length and breadth of the continent connection Africa, particularly Nigeria, to its diverse and far-flung diasporas elsewhere. Satellite television, the Internet, and piracy--at once Nollywood's boon and bane--facilitate the spread of its films across linguistic, cultural, and national boundaries.

"At the level of the individual spectator, Nollywood stirs the imagination, provoking its viewers to compare their own daily lives with what is presented on-screen as they explore the similarities and differences between the pro-filmic and the filmic world. The continent-wide influence of Nollywood, however, does not stop at this level.

"In Tanzania, Kenya, Uganda, and South Africa, for example, Nollywood has served as a model of film production and inspired the growth of local film industries, which in the case of Tanzania have already begun capturing a regional market. In these countries and elsewhere, Nigerian video films are appropriated and reworked into local forms of filmmaking and other cultural models of narrativization with local inflections that borrow and copy heavily from Nollywood."

Matthias Krings & Onookome Okome, Global Nollywood: 

The Transnational Dimensions of an African Video Film Industry

Funding Nollywood, Ali Baba's Analysis

When I look at the growth of entertainment in Nigeria, I very often come to the sad realization that some of my colleagues DONT GET IT, CANT GET IT & WONT GET IT. I say this with the backing of what I have observed in the over 25 years that I have been in this industry. Though it's not the years you have been in the industry that counts. It's the years that you have made to count in the industry.

When I started performing as a stand up comedian in 1988, I did not know anything about the business of showbizness, I just wanted to perform and get paid. I was pleased with fame and the little allowances I got. I saw indications of prosperity and I decided to prove my dad wrong about choosing to be a stand up comedian (he wanted me to read law) and there were no precedent. It was a green field. It was a tough task, but thanks to the likes of Mohammed Danjuma, Yibo Koko, ALLAM Bloo, Tee-A... And many others, the rest is history.

Stand Up was new. The appreciation of it as an art form was either low or non existent. It was not even a sector of entertainment. The real sectors had stage actors, television actors, dancers, choreographers, singers, producers, slapstick comics, clowns, storytellers, radio/TV broadcasters... Etc. I tried to blend into the existing structures to find form, purpose and a launch pad. I even started appearing on radio and television shows to gain relevance.

"Chi" in Igbo Cosmology, by Chinua Achebe

There are two clearly distinct meanings of the word chi in Igbo. The first is often translated as god, guardian angel, personal spirit, soul, spirit-double etc. the second meaning is day or daylight but it most commonly used for those transitional periods between day and night or night and day. Thus we speak of chi ofufo meaning daybreak and chi ojiji, nightfall. We also have the word mgbachi for that most potent hour of noon that splits the day in two, a time favoured in folklore by itinerant spirits and feared by children.

I am chiefly concerned here with the first meaning of chi, a concept so central in Igbo psychology and yet so elusive and enigmatic. The great variety of words and phrases which has been put forward at different times by different people as translations of this concept attests to its great complexity and lends additional force to the famous plea of Dr. J. B. Danquah that we pay one another’s gods the compliment of calling them by their proper name.

In a general way we may visualize a person’s chi as his other identity in spiritland – his spirit being complementing his terrestrial human being; for nothing can stand alone, there must always be another thing standing beside it.

Ten Years On, Toast for Azuh Arinze

Nkoli and Azuh Arinze

(Sam Kargbo)--Oscar Wilde was definitely not a friend of the marriage institution. According to him, marriage is the best way to end a beautiful friendship. It is the road to lifelong loneliness and grief. He so despises the institution that he recommended it only for the cowards. In his view all men at heart do not marry. His parent's marriage may not have even made sense to him as he saw marriage playing the opposite of what love does for mankind.  

If Azuh Arinze ever read this mischievous character, then he must have done so long after he had developed a sixth sense that defines his manliness in terms of the allegiance he has for the first institution established by God after the creation of man (With due apology to non Christians). Contrary to Wilde's claim that the ideal marriage is the one of which the man is deaf and woman is blind, or that marriage is the last refuge for the impotent, Azuh must have enjoyed the good company of clear sighted and virile friends with successful marriages. With the likes of the Teco Bensons as friends, Azuh was sure to make his parents and the society proud.

Prayers and God's Ways

"Not for the first time, I noticed that God had a habit of either not answering one's prayers at all, or answering them in a way that was not straightforward."

Wole Soyinka, Ake: The Years of Childhood

Yes Int'l Announces 4th Annual Lecture

The fourth edition of the annual YES INTERNATIONAL! MAGAZINE LECTURE /COCKTAIL PARTY will hold on Friday, June 19, 2015.

The high profile lecture series, which made its debut in 2012, has Mr. Lolu Akinwunmi, Group CEO, Prima Garnet, one of the leading advertising agencies in Africa, as the Guest Speaker for this year. Mr. Biodun Shobanjo, czar of advertising and Chairman, Troyka Holdings, will be the Chairman, while Barrister Taiwo Adeoluwa, Secretary to the Ogun State Government is the Guest of Honor.

Themed RUNNING A SUCCESSFUL BUSINESS IN NIGERIA – My Experience, it will be anchored by A-list comedian, Gbenga Adeyinka 1st and hold at the Nigerian Institute of International Affairs, Kofo Abayomi Street, Victoria Island, Lagos. Kick off time is 11am.

Ali Baba Slays 'Fashion Critics' on African Glam

Ali Baba, the king of Nigeria’s comedy, turned up super elegantly attired in Urhobo (Niger Delta) traditional garb at the 3rd Africa Magic Viewers’ Choice Awards (AMVCA) held in Lagos this Sunday, March 7. Some overreaching red carpet “fashion police” suggested his attire wasn’t glamorous. But the comedy merchant (re)educated his critics on Africa and glamour, making sure to leave them in doubt as to whom the joke was on.

"Trust you had a great weekend. I did. And had been looking forward to sharing something with you. So, I have also been looking for a clear picture of me that was taken at the #AMVCA ... The closest I could come upon is this courtesy of @NET... But it's not about the picture itself. It was about someone who claims to be a Fashion Critic... who made a comment that I thought I should harp on.

“She said, ‘Bros, didn't you get the invite? It said “black tie”’... herself and a few of her fashion buffs had a laugh at my expense. So I let the laugh settle down and I asked, did you read the part that said ‘black tie or Glamorous?’

“I then saw one of them quickly bring her card invite holder out, read the dress code portion and shoved it back in the case. The dumbest of the four, who is also on television, said something like, but this is not glamorous.

“So I pointed at Kunle Afolayan, who was decked in AGBADA. And she was sucked in to my trick. ‘Eheeeeen! That is glamorous.’ Her cronies agreed.

“So I dropped my joker. 'Really? So it's only the traditional attire from the YORUBA or Hausa speaking part of Nigeria that is glamorous? Is that what you were taught in school? Or is that the position of your media house? Or is that all your knowledge about fashion availed you? Maybe you are TRIBALISTIC. Maybe you think AFRICANS must look like a white man to be glamorous! Maybe you have no values! By the way, I thought this was an AFRICAN Magic Viewers' Choice Awards’ (notice the capital letters)?

Religion: A Repository of Society's Values

"A society’s religion is its repository of values and ways of interpreting not only their individual and social lives, but also their universal relationship with nature."

Barak Obama: What's in a Name?

OBAMA: Original Black African Managing America 

BARAK: Born African Raised American complete Kenyan

--Pablo (Kenneth Kimuli), Ugandan Comedian