AMAA 2024 highs. AMAA 2024 lows. The Africa Movie Academy Awards are a very strange entity. And that’s not just my opinion. It is shared by many in the Nigerian film industry and, possibly, the larger African one. They just won’t say it publicly.
This past weekend, a lot more of its strangeness was on display at the Balmoral Convention Centre in Lagos, Nigeria, where the awards ceremony celebrated its 20th anniversary. As is the case with events of its nature, there were highs—principally conveyed by winners. And there were lows. Many lows.
Below, Film Efiko presents the AMAA 2024 highs and lows.
Five AMAA 2024 Lows
1. Late Start Time
You would find that on the video shared online by the organisers of the 2024 AMAA, there’s no time. If it felt like a mistake, at the venue it seemed like it was by design. About two hours after the 7pm I was told the event would start, people were still carting industrial fans into the hall. Every person who arrived the venue was told to wait on the crowded red carpet.
Until it was Rita Dominic’s turn. She pretty much just waltzed ahead of the timid girls telling her of the waiting policy. But then, she didn’t get too far. Dominic is obviously used to entering places guarded by fearsome bouncers who are reduced to jelly by her celebrity. In this case, what wasn’t ready just wasn’t ready. It wasn’t gatekeeping; it was just Nigerian mediocrity holding everyone back.
By 8pm, a burly man, rather rude man wearing a black tshirt was telling a small gathering at the entrance of the hall that only nominees will be going in for now. “Nominees first…nominees o,” he shouted.
20 editions in, AMAA still runs like amateur production by people who are about as terrible as incompetent civil servants.
2. The treatment of foreign nominees
Every African foreigner invited award shows in Nigeria suffers the same fate: little fanfare if they are called out as nominees. The insular Nigerian culture barely allows people applaud nominees they don’t know. This is a problem revolving around African film distribution. But it is also commentary on Nigeria’s cultural insularity.
This year, that awful treatment spread to logistics. Nominees from Namibia were stranded at the airport for two hours. At the event premises, they were asked to do press only to be told “We don’t know those movies” when they approached a media person. On social media, Ghanaians are complaining about how their filmmakers were treated.
Two decades in, AMAA hasn’t figured that foreign nominees need to get a special kind of media attention because Africa hasn’t solved inter-country film distribution. It is shameful.
“It’s very disorganised,” Namibian filmmaker Perivi Katjavivi, whose film, Under The Hanging Tree, ended up winning two awards, told me. He’s a saint of understatement.
3. More music than cinema
By 8.20pm, when non-nominees were let in, a band was still singing songs from the 1980s. George Michael’s Faith, Phil Collins’ Find a Way to My Heart by Phil Collins. If you walked into the hall more than an hour after an event claiming to be African cinema’s biggest night, you would have no idea that the subject was movies. It looked like a gaudy gathering for a gaggle of geriatrics.
4. The speeches
Although the event started late, there were still so many speeches, very few of them connected to the movies that we had come to celebrate. The founder of the AMAA, Peace Anyiam-Osigwe, had passed on a couple years ago and deserved her celebration. But so many of the speakers were needlessly long. The minister of culture, Hannatu Musawa, spoke about figuring out infrastructure for the entertainment scene, which was well-meaning—but it didn’t seem like the right place for such an announcement. She, at least, offered more than the rambling one of the Anyiam-Osigwes foisted on the audience.
5. The South African Absence
A South African film, Jahmil X.T Qubeka’s The Queenstown Kings, was the second most nominated film on the night. But not a single member of its cast and crew were in attendance. It seemed like there wasn’t even a South African film worker in the audience—every time Queenstown won an award, it was received by a Nigerian.
The film ended up tied with Nigeria’s The Weekend as the most awarded project on the night. That the Netflix-supported film is one of Qubeka’s weakest projects is story for another article.
Five AMAA 2024 Highs
1. Boda Love Charm
The filmmakers behind Boda Love charmed the AMAA 2024 host country by saying they were enjoying themselves in Lagos. “We don’t want to go o,” she said. It was a reminder that despite Nigeria’s problems, the country and its entertainment capital, Lagos, still have a peculiar charm.
2. Femi Kuti’s Beng Beng Beng
To prove it really is a show by and for old heads, AMAA got Femi Kuti to play his ancient hit, “Beng Beng Beng”. Thankfully, the man showed the crowd that he still has it. Although released in 1998, the song still packs a bang performed live.
3. Segun Arinze and Joselyn Dumas Chemistry
It is hard to tell why it worked as it did but the pairing of Nigerian actor Segun Arinze and Ghanaian actress Joselyn Dumas on the AMAA stage was often delightful. Arinze took shots that could come across as a tad cruel but Dumas was gracious all through—even if she did almost rip through Nigeria by stating its perennial issues during a Ghana jollof vs Nigerian jollof banter.
Thankfully, she didn’t pull the trigger as she really could have. She disappeared for a bit in the middle of the overlong event but returned towards the end of the event.
4. The winners
Irrespective of an awards ceremony’s failings, and the AMAAs have a lot of failings, it is always gratifying to see people happy to be rewarded for their work. On this occasion, Michelle Lemuya, who won the Best Young/Promising Actor category was the most adorable winner.
It was also quite nice to see Kagho Idhebor, who won the Best Cinematography category, receive an award for his work in The Weekend. He is one of the most well-known cinematographers in Nigeria’s film industry, so it was mildly surprising that this was his first award. Also notable: Femi Adebayo dancing to receive his award for his supporting role in Jagun Jagun.
5. Daniel Oriahi’s Best Film Speech
At some point during the ceremony, it seemed like the most nominated film for AMAA 2024, The Weekend, would end up emptyhanded. That changed when the film won its first award and then its second. When it won its fourth and the event’s biggest award, the crew packed themselves on the stage.
Daniel Oriahi, who directed it, then gave a speech in which he thanked many people. His most touching gratitude went to his mother, the woman who gave him permission to take up filmmaking, even if her son had studied economics. “She said go for it,” he said. And her son did.
