BSIFF 2025: The Ethical Universe of Nana Kofi Asihene’s “Wrong Way” 

When you think of action in its purest sense, it often comes down to choice, doing what is right, wrong, or somewhere in between, and dealing with the ripple effects that follow. Every action births a consequence, whether it affects one person or an entire society. A corrupt politician who steals from public coffers destabilizes a nation. A desperate young man, robbed of opportunity, turns to crime and leaves behind a trail of pain. Each reaction feeds into another, forming a chain that defines who we are and what we become. It is this idea, and the interconnectedness of actions and consequences, that forms the heartbeat of Wrong Way, a short crime drama directed by Ghanaian filmmaker Nana Kofi Asihene. The film follows a young man who joins his friends in an armed robbery operation where he accidentally shoots and kills a passenger, and must live with the guilt afterwards. Set in modern Ghana society, the film explores a dark web of crime, survival and the get-rich-quick syndrome.

Wrong Way is written by Aphua Larbi-Amoah, co-produced with Issac “Skyface” Mensah and Nana Kofi Asihene. It is the product of a partnership that exists between the filmmaking group, which would see them take up rotational roles on every production. Larbi-Amoah and Asihene have previously worked together on a project and currently have two features and a documentary in the works, an arrangement that also involves a production company, Afters Media, owned by a friend of Asihene’s. Having observed how not only funding problems but also the sparseness of mutually beneficial partnerships undermine the Ghanaian film industry, Asihene and his team were out to make a difference with Wrong Way. For them, the director says, it was a statement, one of many steps towards rewiring the system of creative collaborations in the industry while telling stories that matter and resonate with contemporary youth culture.

At first, Asihene and his team did not approach the making of Wrong Way with immediacy. It all started with the writer sending him the script, which he read and kept in mind for a period of time. When they eventually wanted to make a short film, conversations around the script came up and it felt like it was the right time to amplify the topical issues therein. A week after preliminary talks, they dove into pre-production, with the director wanting to keep the execution as straightforward as possible. They did casting and had production meetings, while principal photography took place in a day. In the film, characters speak pidgin English, Ga and Akan, which the director justifies as a reflection of the country’s multilingual reality.

“So this film is like a testament of what collaboration in Ghana looks like, would look like if we did it more and if we expanded it.” Asihene says over an evening Google Meet conversation. His hope is that their “collaboration baby” gets extended into a feature film some day and opens the gate to more team successes. In the opening scene of Wrong Way, the protagonist engages in a telephone conversation with a lady, a romantic interest we never meet throughout. We are not sure of the identity of the mystery lady, whether or not she is the one killed at the armed robbery scene. The anonymity of the female love interest creates room for curiosity, and that is one gap that the storytellers may later seek to exploit. For Asihene, the way to go would be a second short film that presents the girl’s perspective of the narrative, and possibly offshoots that reflect interconnected Afrocentric social preoccupations.

Asihene’s filmmaking expedition draws from his flamboyant creative background. Back in school when he studied fine arts, he acquired skills in drawing, painting, and evolved into photography and graphics design. He obtained a degree in textile design, gaining exposure in fashion design, which came in handy whenever he did costume design for productions. Deep in the arts, he developed an instinct for storytelling through photography before moving on to making music videos and later shooting television commercials. As a music video director, he worked with several Ghanaian and other African talents, including Nigerian rapper Ice Prince. It seemed, for Asihene, that with each venture he soon became bored and needed a new thrill. With his latest incursion into filmmaking, beginning with short films, the creative has found a medium that allows for a synergy of all his experiences so far. It is the ultimate, most cohesive expression of his identity.

In Ghana, platforms such as BlackStar International Film Festival (BSIFF) and Ghana Movie Awards enjoy prestige for their attraction and celebration of local talents. Last year, Asihene and his team won the Best Short Film with Aahi (Taboo), another work of theirs, at the  Ghana Movie Awards. It encouraged them to submit Wrong Way for screening at the latest edition of BSIFF though they nearly missed the deadline. The decision turned out to be an astute one as the film earned a nomination in the Best Ghanaian Showcase category, alongside Ramesh Jai Gulabrai’s Love and Jollof, Nana Obrempong Barima’s Coinquest and Wael H. Hakim’s Sweet Palm wine.

But Asihene’s filmmaking dreams, as one would expect of a restless creative, stretches beyond his fatherland. He wants to make films with Nigerians, Kenyans, South Africans and other creatives across the continent, straddling new worldviews and heterogeneous cultures. He recently attended the National Film Dialogue, organized by the National Film Authority in Ghana, where he learnt about their plan to develop a distribution system that targets just one percentage of Ghana’s thirty-five million population. This, for him, is commendable. Yet he imagines a Pan-African distribution network that links Anglophone and Francophone countries, which would ease cross-boarder collaborations and wider audience engagements. “What is the use of making these films if Africans cannot watch them or cannot afford to watch them,” he asks. “If we can find a way to connect our markets, then we would not need to depend on foreign streaming services. We would build our own ecosystem”.

Asihene believes that research is essential to understanding the themes and stories that connect African audiences while also celebrating their differences. To him, unity through storytelling feels more tangible, even when it begins within one’s immediate environment, and that first step, though a morally induced one, is ultimately what Wrong Way embodies.