Low budget Nollywood productions on the distortion of African culture
Since 1903, when the first screening of a film took place at Glover Memorial Hall, in Lagos, cinema has evolved through the colonial era, the independence era, the indigenization era and the Nollywood period (Mgbejume 1989; Okon 1990; Onuzulike 2010). A major event shaping the Nigerian film industry was the Structural Adjustment Programs (SAPs) Nigeria went through during the 1980s; the SAPs impoverished many Nigerians (Ogundimu 2009; Olayiwola 2007). With celluloid being very expensive, film-makers had to rely on other formats to tell their stories. An important event that paved the way for Nollywood was the traditional Yoruba Travelling Theatre movement of the 1980s, pioneered by director Chief Hubert Ogunde and his contemporary Ola Balogun (McCall 2002; Onuzulike 2010).. Many have credited Living in Bondage for ushering in the name ‘Nollywood’ (Abah 2008; Haynes 2000, 2005).Nollywood, which mirrors the names of Hollywood and Bollywood, is the name of the Nigerian movie industry. Despite the fact that Nigeria had been producing movies since the colonial period, the movie Living in Bondage (1992), which sold over 750,000 copies, is typically credited with ushering in Nollywood films (The Economist 2006). A 2006 survey conducted by the UNESCO Institute for Statistics (UIS) classified Nollywood as the second-largest film producer in the world, only behind Bollywood. Hollywood was ranked third. The survey found that Bollywood produced 1,091 feature-length films, Nollywood produced 872 (all in video format) while Hollywood released 485 major film productions (UNESCO Press 2009). These statistics are relevant because it is often assumed that Hollywood makes more movies since it is more popular and has significantly higher marketing budgets. Conversely, while Nollywood’s marketing budget is minimal, the distribu-tion of video films is cheaper and has wider appeal, in part because it is rela-tively easy for consumers to access video films. The industries also diverge in that Hollywood predominantly portrays the western world while Nollywood depicts the African world. There are positive and negative aspects to the Nollywood phenomenon. Some of the benefits are that it has provided a platform for Africans to tell their own stories, and it makes employment options available to many indi-viduals. The industry employs about one million people in Nigeria, which makes it the second-largest employer in Nigeria after the agriculture sector (The Economist 2006). The National Film and Video Censors Board (NFVCB) estimates that the industry generates sales of between $200 million and $300 million per year, and provides substantial revenue to the government. Nollywood also creates venues for minorities and the voices of non-dominant ideologies to be heard, in part because it is not uniformly constructed or influ-enced by corporations. As a by-product for Africans, Nollywood serves as a source of cultural preservation. The negative aspects of Nollywood include that it continues to depict some stereotypes that were originally formulated and perpetuated by the West. Nevertheless, video films have created an avenue for Africans to tell their own stories as opposed to receiving western versions. McCall argues that the Nigerian video industry, however, has changed [the West’s telling of African stories and values] forever. In market stalls and corner stores across Nigeria, and increasingly in cities and towns across Africa [and even in the US], these market-driven movies have become the engine of distinctively African popular culture
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