It’s incredibly good times for Nollywood filmmaker Wumi Toriola. Her debut feature on the big screen, Queen Lateefah, has grossed over ₦315m at the box office. Doing so has created a new item in Nigeria’s cinematic history, as her film takes a spot in the highest-grossing Nollywood titles list.
Now at number 9 in the all-time list, Queen Lateefah has pushed 2023’s Malaika and 2019’s Sugar Rush into the 10th and 11th position. And with the current number 8 and 7, King of Thieves and Brotherhood, at ₦320m and ₦328m, Toriola’s film can reasonably be expected to overtake them both and climb higher than its current position.
Toriola took to her Instagram account to express her excitement, thanking fans for their support with an instagram post: “l’m super excited to announce my first ever cinema movie #QUEENLATEEFAH grosses 316 million and it’s still climbing…A huge shoutout to everyone who has taken out time to see this movie.”
Queen Lateefah‘s success is also the success of the Cinemaxx, the relatively unknown outfit behind its distribution. This is the first of the distributor’s films to get into the top 10 chart, and, according to Toriola, her film is the highest-grossing Nollywood title “by an independent distributor”.
While Toriola is the film’s producer (alongside Judith Audu), the film is directed by Adeoluwa Owu. It stars Toriola herself, as well as Kunle Remi, Femi Adebayo, Salami Rotimi, Lateef Adedimeji, and Nancy Isime. It is the story of a businessman who falls in love with a wealthy woman, who isn’t quite what she seems.
The film was released on September 27 and is based on a character popular on YouTube. Queen Lateefah marks the character’s first appearance within the halls of a cinema.
