Africa Needs To Deeply Engage Documentary Format In Telling Its Story

THE GUARDIAN on SUNDAY, 25 MARCH 2012 00:00 FEMI ODUGBEMI SUNDAY MAGAZINE- ARTS

(Being the welcome address by  FEMI ODUGBEMI, Executive Director of the iREPRESENT Documentary Film Festival, 2012 at the opening of the festival at the on Thursday March 22, 2012 Terra Kulture, VI, Lagos)

 WELCOME to the second edition of the IREPRESENT INTERNATIONAL DOCUMENTARY FILM FESTIVAL, aka iREP DOCU-FEST.  We are dedicated to promoting awareness about the power of documentary films to deepen our shared experiences, especially in the areas of social and cultural education and as well as give voice to the African experience globally.

It’s been an interesting experience since our maiden edition. Since last year, we have tried to sustain the energy with our monthly film screening programme in partnership with Freedom Park and Goethe Institut and the Nigerian Film Corporation. We have also since then held a very successful training programme on Scriptwriting for Non-Fiction and Fictional films in partnership with the Public Affairs section of the US Embassy. We believe we are beginning to build a critical mass of viewers and filmmakers who are finding that the power to understand and define their personal journeys as Africans, as Nigerians can find expression in this artform.

This year, the festival is based on the framework: Africa In Self-Conversation and it would explore the theme: Democracy and Culture — The Documentary Film Intervention.

It is a theme inspired by our experience in Nigeria in January this year when the issue of the removal of oil subsidy snowballed into an important “self-conversation” about integrity in government and about the value of our participatory democracy. The vehicle for that self-conversation was driven by the mass exchange of information and perspectives via documentary videos on Youtube and the social media platforms on the Internet.

The conversations were intense and defining, especially in its interrogations of the value of democracy to development. The political culture of Africa and the world is rapidly changing and African filmmakers have a unique opportunity to define its impact through the power of their images. Today documentary filmmaking is more important than ever.

The scope of the Festival would cover such areas as Democracy and Demonstrations, New media technology and participatory democracy, and the potentials of the Nigerian film industry ‘Nollywood’ to understand the value and meaning of their images in the context of the fictional stories told. Culture is no longer a sub-theme in the politics of the global information order. It is the basis of it.

We have this sub-theme asking the provocative question: ‘Is Nollywood Documentary?’ It is for a specific reason. It is meant to interrogate an important proposition which averses that an African filmmaker has unusual responsibility in his imagery, beyond mere entertainment; he has the responsibility of the “cultural representation” in his work – irrespective of whether that film is fiction or non-fiction, because the representation of the African experience has always suffered from the fact that it has been subjected to interpretations by people outside of the experience. It has become imperative for African filmmakers to understand that the images in their narrative have much more power than that of entertainment. Nollywood is powerful today – it has become much more than a film industry for entertainment, it has become more or less the representation of the African experience in many parts of the world and it is becoming the image template for defining what Africa looks like, how we speak, dress and the values that we uphold. So we feel Filmmakers in Nigeria especially in Nollywood need that conversation and that understanding that we allow them to begin to take that responsibility seriously.

 For us, it is not about iREP trying to recruit Nollywood filmmakers to do Documentaries, though we feel with better understanding more of that will happen, it is about creating a timely conversation on how powerful images are in a world that is globalised. If we say we want to change the narrative of Africa, if we say we want Africa to be empowered economically and politically, it is critical for us to begin to manage the images of Africa that subsist in the global information order, from that of poverty and pain and disease and war to one that begins to speak and showcase inspirational breakthroughs, inspirational people and achievements. Africa has a lot to teach the world. The  values of Africa are important to the world, in spirituality, in community, values of integrity and honesty that are embedded in our culture. The only way we can do that, our biggest weapon  FOR this contribution is film.

We are very happy to welcome to this conversation very exciting thinkers and filmmakers who we know will make this festival memorable. Thank you for coming Professor Jean Paul Colleyn, Director of Institute of African Studies, Paris. He is an Anthropologist, Filmmaker and Scholar and a wonderful gentleman.

I want to say a special Welcome to our friends from AG DOK — Association of Independent Producers in Germany, and APIC — Association of  Independent Filmmakers, Cameroun. Our partnership with the Goethe Institut is forging a collaborative conversation. Later today in a Producers’ Roundtable that we hope will enlarge and enrich the possibilities of filmmaker-to-filmmaker cooperations. A special welcome home to our ‘son’ of the soil Branwen Okpako. And to Katarina Hedren of Democratic Network Africa; thank you for staying back from MOKOLO to contribute to IREP.

And welcome our brothers from the Northern arm of our film industry – Mikail, Nasiru and Musa. Specially,  we thank the Director of the Goethe Institut, Kano, Frank Roger for facilitating the participation of our brothers from Kannywood.

We specially welcome the recipients of this year’s iREP Hall of FAME AWARD – Cyril, Sandra, Yussuf and Francis. You richly deserve more than the modest applause we are giving you today.

I want to say a special thank you and well done to Marc-Andre and to Barbel for making it possible to screen some the very exciting films we have lined up. Thank you.

We hope hat this relationship will be mutually beneficial to us all.

We hope all our visitors will enjoy the interaction with our local industry and their “encounter” with our beautiful city of Lagos. And we hope at the end of the 4-day event we all would have moved even further to a fuller understanding of Documentaries as an important artform to defining our selfs, our culture, our aspiration as a community and our place in the world.

www.irepfilmfestival.com 3 Oguntona Crescent, Gbagada Phase 1, Lagos Nigeria. P.O. Box 36 Surulere. T: +234 803 425 1963, +234 802 201 6495, +234 803 403 0646 E: info@irepfilmfestival.com