In late 2020, a US-based friend visited Niyi Akinmolayan in tears and with complaints after losing fifty million naira over a sham filmmaking deal. She had contracted a man she met on Twitter (now X) to make a film because she thought he was a notable filmmaker in Nigeria based on how much knowledge of the industry he seemed to possess. The whole arrangement snowballed into disputes between both parties, as the project failed to materialize. Akinmolayan had no choice but to intervene and come through for his friend, as he was used to doing for those who had run into trouble from dealing with charlatans. It seemed that particular sob story was the last straw that broke the camel’s back. He knew it was time to do more than just “come through”. He decided to position himself on the frontlines of the war against fraud in the Nigerian film industry and launched Nollywood Filmmaker—a digital platform designed to recognize genuine film professionals and connect them with investors and first-time filmmakers.
For the past few years in Nigeria, streaming platforms like Netflix and Amazon Prime Video have traversed the country’s film market, partnering with notable filmmakers to produce Originals and offering mouthwatering distribution deals to elevate Nigerian storytelling. On 7th September 2018, Netflix secured Genevieve Nnaji’s Lionheart, a film that became the streamer’s first Original title from Nigeria. As of 2024, in its eight years of reign in this region, the streaming giant has expended over 23 million dollars in Nigerian film projects, successfully collaborating with producers like Kemi Adetiba (King of Boys, The Return of The King), Editi Effiong (The Black Book), Femi Adebayo (Jagun Jagun), Mo Abudu (Oloture 1 & 2, The Wedding Party 2, Elesin Oba: The King’s Horseman, Blood Sisters), Kunle Afolayan (Aníkúlápó, Aníkúlápó: Rise of the Spectre, Swallow, Ijogbon, Citation), Chinenye Nworah (Shanty Town), Naz Onuzo (Far From Home), Adebimpe Oyebade (Lisabi 1 & 2), Kene Egbue (Afamefuna: An Nwa Boi Story), and Charles Okpaleke (Blood Vessel, Hijack ’93). In 2023, Gangs of Lagos, produced and directed by Jade Osiberu, became the first Nigerian Original on Prime Video, marking the streamer’s formal entry into the Nigerian market.
In 2022, the Akinmolayan-led Anthill Studios, a film company that is at least fifteen years old, struck an exclusive licensing arrangement with Amazon Prime Video. Since then, it has released films like The House of Secrets, Criminal, Rainmakers (a documentary), and Mikolo, amidst partnerships with other filmmakers (for instance, with Eniola Ajao on Beasts Of Two Worlds and Femi Adebayo on Jagun Jagun, as well as outfits like Inkblot and FilmOne). Musing over the relationship between these streamers and Nigerian filmmakers, Akinmolayan admits there has been a poor market operation. He realizes a gap—what he calls “an unspoken problem”—in their operations, which he intends to gradually fill with Nollywood Filmmaker. “We could talk about the fact that the market penetration is not much,” he says. “But we didn’t really have the capacity that could service the needs of those platforms and give high value. So, if they wanted to make three originals, they probably could when they do it sparingly with a few producers. But what if they wanted to make four at the same time?” This thought also triggered Akinmolayan’s ingenious idea of creating a database of duly verified film crews and companies. Nollywood Filmmaker will provide for its community, a series of standard trainings and tests to improve the quality of their experience and crafts as film professionals, enough to be recommended to clients in need of their services. After patronage, clients are allowed to rate the service delivery of the professionals on the platform, which is driven towards building trust and also growing the capacity of the industry.
On Akinmolayan’s social media pages, Aproko Doctor is credited as Nollywood Filmmaker’s first customer. The medical doctor and health influencer, who is known for his witty, socially savvy approach to addressing health issues, was in attendance at the official launch of the digital film initiative, where he engaged Akinmolayan’s team on a project he is working on. Since the launch of the initiative, as observed through social media, some Nollywood professionals, including cinematographers and protégés of Akinmolayan, Nora Awolowo and Barnabas Emordi, have pledged their commitment to the brand.
It is a scorching Tuesday afternoon in April at the Ikeja-situated Anthill Studios where Akinmolayan’s office lies. The nondescript building is mindfully spacious with a library-esque quietness; it has the guardedness of a semi-formal letter yet feels like a sanctuary for permissible freewheeling creativity. One of the rooms in the building, a dimly lit, cozy workspace with a couple of creatives whose faces are glued to their computer screens, is where the conversation with Akinmolayan ensues. He remains seated throughout the hour-long conversation and takes a break twice to answer his phone calls. A close observation of his demeanour on and off the phone call reveals a quiet charm, the self-assuredness of a man who has seen it all not only as a creative that is conversant with industry bottlenecks but also as a student of life forged from a panoply of experiences. From the way he freely shares opinions and engages people on X, Akinmolayan’s open-mindedness is palpable. In an industry with storied gate keepers, the Anthill boss has chosen to be different. When he is asked about the possibility of his tech-driven brainchild being misinterpreted as a cabal, the filmmaker says this cannot be so because over 75% of the signups so far were people who identified as aspiring filmmakers.
According to the official website at www.nollywoodfilmmaker.com, Nollywood Filmmaker provides online consultancy services, including production planning, production support, marketing and distribution, and legal consultations. It also includes chats with experts for advice and feedback on scripts and projects. An insightful instance is that of someone who approached Akinmolayan’s team for help on how to go about shooting a film set in Northern Nigeria. However, due to the sensitive situation of the region at the time, the person was advised against proceeding with the project because it would be nearly impossible to get g it to domestic cinemas and secure local distribution for the film. For productions of this nature—if they must be brought to life—the festival route is the best to follow.
While there are overlapping responsibilities between Anthill Studios and Nollywood Filmmaker, Akinmolayan draws a line between them. To him, the former provides human resources to accomplish the goals of the latter, at least for a start; whereas the latter can be likened to the popular car-hailing service company, Uber, which “itself is not a car company, but it can decide to have a set of rides if they want.” One of the services on Nollywood Filmmaker, for instance, is “watch my film and advise”. When a filmmaker applies for this service on the platform, the designated consultants gather to privately watch the film at the studio in Anthill before reverting, ensuring to protect the creative’s intellectual property.
Akinmolayan’s filmmaking journey is a colourful patchwork. Born in the 1980s, he grew up in a middle-class Yoruba home where he and his siblings were exposed to both the arts and sciences. They were encouraged to get involved in church dramas and often listened to their mother impress them with evening tales. As a child, Akinmolayan discovered and became fascinated with the computer and digital camera and began developing his technical skills. He attended Yaba College of Technology, where he studied Engineering. But all along, he had deep interests in animation, which later morphed into filmmaking ambitions, with the filmmaker making what he calls “a natural transition” into the world of Nollywood. This began with him working as a graphics and website designer and as an apprentice to Nollywood filmmakers. He then developed himself in animation, video editing, and visual effects—skills that were instrumental to his debut, the highly experimental yet commercially unsuccessful 2010 production, Kajola. The 130-million-naira budget dystopian Sci-Fi film, anchored on daring CGI, was released under the auspices of Anthill Studios. It is set in 2059 in a futuristic Nigerian society, and follows the aftermath of a second civil war in Lagos. In the film, the elites all relocate to the island part of Lagos, where they build an ultramodern city, while the mainland is abandoned, amidst plans to stop a rebel leader from destabilizing the government by building cities on the mainland and eliminating the remaining war survivors in the region.
Even though Kajola was a commercial flop and was severely criticized by people who saw it in the cinemas, it laid the foundation for the use of technology in Nollywood films. It inspired filmmakers—such as Dare Olaitan (Ile Owo, Ojukokoro) who claimed to have been impressed by a scene in Kajola where the Third Mainland bridge was blown up—to be audacious and unconventional. Many years later, Anthill has evolved with more convincing CGI and visual tricks, as recently noticed in projects like Casa De Novia and Mikolo. “Filmmaking is not a predominantly artistic activity,” Akinmolayan is convinced. And rightly so. It is true that the endgame of filmmaking is the art of movement, distance, space, colour, time, and music. But the process itself to achieving this is a scientific one, requiring a great deal of calculations and the infusion of technology. Without modern technology, including the digital camera, it would have been impossible to produce films of any kind, anywhere in the world, let alone quality ones. That’s why Akinmolayan recommends that Nigerians must be trained in the technology of filmmaking to elevate their game in Nollywood. He agrees with George Lucas’s consideration of films as special effects, noting the innate creative flair that is required to constantly trick people with technology.
In 1971, George Lucas, an American filmmaker, founded the production company Lucasfilm Ltd, which had different subsidiaries, including Industrial Light & Magic, established four years later, that became the foremost special-effects workshop in the American film industry. The filmmaker is the progenitor of Star Wars, one of the most commercially successful media franchises of all time, which began with the 1977 eponymous title written and directed by Lucas himself. The high-tech space opera universe is today considered a revolutionary effort in science fiction, a genre that was hitherto largely undervalued. In conversation with Akinmolayan, his repeated references to Lucas suggest a strong admiration for and influence by the American director’s style, likely in relation to filmmaking or storytelling techniques.
Last year, British actor of Nigerian descent John Boyega was a guest speaker at a fireside chat at the 13th edition of the Africa International Film Festival (AFRIFF 2024), where he talked about his evolution in Hollywood and highlighted the need for more strategic collaborations between Hollywood and Nollywood. He hinted that such alliances have often been stalled due to poor ethics and operations in the domestic industry. “It’s simply not happening because of these stereotypes also being put out there about the quality of filmmaking,” he said. Boyega got his breakout role as Moses in the 2011 British science fiction comedy horror film Attack the Block, and is also famous for his roles in Star Wars and The Woman King. For The Woman King, an American historical film about an elite 17th- to 19th-century West African female army, Boyega claimed there were initial plans to shoot in Nigeria until the location was eventually moved to South Africa. Boyega also starred alongside Nigerian acts Genevieve Nnaji and Onyeka Onwenu in the 2013 film Half Of A Yellow Sun, an adaptation of Chimamanda Adichie’s war-based novel of the same title, which is one of the breakthroughs in collaboration between the British and Nigerian film industries.
Another recent international breakthrough for Nigeria is the upcoming American fantasy drama Children of Blood and Bone, adapted from Nigerian-American Tomi Adeyemi’s novel. With production currently in motion, the film contains an ensemble of Black actors from America, Britain, and Nigeria, with the likes of Richard Mofe-Damijo, child actor Pamilerin Ayodeji, and pop star Ayra Starr being part of the cast. Akinmolayan hopes to create a sustainable system to achieve more collaborations of this nature. He wants to make it possible for Hollywood filmmakers to rely on well-trained home-based crew members to film in Nigeria instead of having to spend a lot more to bring along hundreds of their crew members from abroad.
As part of efforts to create a structured industry, Akinmolayan is investing in family drama entertainment. His YouTube channel, launched with the name Anthill Family, serves this purpose. He wants to explore content that is children-friendly and accessible. He took his first leap of faith with the 2023 cinema production of Mikolo, a live-action animation fantasy drama with a cast led by child actors Pamilerin Ayodeji and Fiyinfoluwa Asenuga, both products of Stan Nze’s The Kids Can Act Initiative. Temi and The Labalaba Band, which premièred on YouTube on April 19th, is the filmmaker’s sophomore attempt at popularizing this genre. There are plans to broadcast the show on NTA and some terrestrial networks, with the filmmaker keen on generating income through merchandising and sponsorships. On his plans to further develop child actors, he says he is working on projects specially designed for them, but also needs to keep running more shows that can comfortably feature these children. Unlike having kids play roles in PG-rated films that they cannot see in cinemas, the filmmaker is carving a niche for children shows that can be screened by the child actors themselves.
Akinmolayan is convinced that social media is a blessing to the creative in this modern age. To survive in the entertainment industry in Nigeria, and elsewhere, a creative must constantly position themselves for opportunities through strategic and consistent use of the media. A Culture Custodian article, YouTube and the Democratization of Nollywood, details this reality through the development of the video-sharing platform in Nigeria in 2011 and the consequent birth of content creators such as Mark Angel, Brodda Shaggi, Craze Clown, Brain Jotter, Nasboi, Mr. Macaroni, Sabinus and Taaooma—with many of these skitmakers successfully integrated into Nollywood. In September 2017, TikTok launched in the international market and became widely popular in Nigeria during the lockdown, giving rise to entertainers like Peller, Jadrolita, and DJ Chicken. In 2024,. Peller, who currently boasts 2.4 million TikTok followers and 1.8 million Instagram followers, marked his Nollywood entrance with a brief appearance in Toyin Abraham’s Alakada: Bad and Boujee. There is also Layi Wasabi, known for his lawyer character in his skits, who set out as a digital content creator and gained massive popularity that paved the way for his Nollywood career. Layi Wasabi has starred in films such as Anikulapo: Rise of The Spectre, Adire, Japa! and Everybody Loves Jenifa.
It is for this reason that actors and music artists employ the services of talent management companies, record labels, and social media managers to protect and project their brands. However, the place of raw talent in a world that is obsessed with social media fame has become a subject of discourse, especially as there are rumours of Nigerian filmmakers casting actors predominantly based on their social media following, sacrificing talent on the altar of social currency. But Akinmolayan maintains that this is a global problem, not peculiar to the Nigerian film ecosystem. “We started having Hollywood actors also call out studios for hiring people based on social media following,” he says. Earlier this year, Hollywood actress Maya Hawke complained about producers in the American film industry casting actors based on social media following. The power of social media and content creation has been further reinforced with backings from major economic fortresses of the world. Around January this year, the United Arab Emirates (UAE) launched the Creators HQ at Emirates Towers, an initiative backed by a $40.8 million fund and aimed at attracting 10,000 influencers to the country with a view towards positioning as the world’s foremost destination for digital content creators. Aware of this development, Akinmolayan recommends the need for Nollywood actors to evolve with the times, building a stable social media presence in addition to honing their skills.
