Kudzai Sevenzo nominated for AMAA Awards

Kudzai Sevenzo

Kudzai Nyarai Sevenzo is up for an award at the Africa Movie Academy Awards (AMAA) scheduled for Lagos, Nigeria, on April 22. The singer-actress has been nominated in the Best Actress category for her role in “Playing Warriors”, a Zimbabwean feature film.

The awards are Africa’s most prestigious awards for filmmakers. Only films produced and released between December 2010 and December 2011 were eligible. The winners will be announced at a glittering ceremony to be hosted by “Heroes” star Jimmy Jean-Louis.

For the first time, the awards will be held in Lagos rather than Bayelsa in Nigeria. “Our theme this year is ‘Africa Rising’,” said AMAA founder Peace Anyiam-Osigwe. “Africa’s economies are consistently growing faster than those of other regions of the world and our film industries are following suit. With the success of last year’s AMAA winner, ‘Viva Riva!’, all of a sudden there’s this great excitement about the potential of the African film industry, which is clearly demonstrated in this year’s diverse nominees.”

  

Most nominated films include South Africa’s “Otelo Burning” and “How to 2 Steal 2 Million”; Nigeria’s “Adesuwa”; Ghana’s “Somewhere in Africa”; The Nigerian-South African co-production “Man on Ground”; and Kenya’s “Rugged Priest”.

Nigeria received 52 nominations, South Africa was a close second with 45 nominations, followed by Ghana with 17, Kenya with 14, Uganda with five, Tanzania with three, and Algeria, Cameroon, Guinea, Rwanda and Zimbabwe were nominated once. There were also nominations for films linked to the Diaspora — in America, Canada, France, Germany, Guadalupe, Italy, Jamaica and the UK. 

A total of 328 entries from across Africa were received this year up from 220 in 2011. This includes 134 feature films, 88 short films, 57 documentaries and six animations. Forty-three entries came from Africans in the Diaspora with the other entries coming from 23 countries across the continent.  South African surfing film “Otelo Burning”, directed by Sara Blecher, scooped the most nominees (13), followed closely by South African film noir “How 2 Steal 2 Million” (11) and Nigeria’s Benin-set historical epic “Adesuwa” (10). 

Ghana’s civil war film “Somewhere in Africa”, has seven nominations, as does the Nigerian-South African xenophobia-themed co-production “Man on Ground”, while Kenya’s “Rugged Priest” has six nominations.

Dr Asantewa Olantunji, director of programming at the Pan African Film Festival, headed this year’s jury.

The jury included June Giavanni, programmer for Planet Africa at the Toronto International Film Festival; Keith Shiri, founder and film curator at the London Festival, Africa at the Pictures, Dorothee Wenner, a curator at the Berlin Film Festival, Shaibu Husseini, an actor, dancer and The Nigerian Guardian arts journalist, Steve Ayorinde.

Editor-in-Chief of The Daily Mirror, Ayoko Babu, executive director of the Pan African Film Festival Dr Hyginus Ekwuazi, a film scholar and critic and directors Berni Goldblat and John Akomfrah, OBE were also part of the panel.Culled from Herald