NAN-ELS-2
Policies
By Collins Yakubu-Hammer
Abuja, Jan. 30, 2017 (NAN) Mr Robert Peters, an award winning movie director has urged the Federal Government to come up with policies to make Nollywood thrive.
Peters made the call in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on Tuesday in Abuja.
The director of the movie “30 Days in Atlanta’’ and “Trip to Jamaica’’ said the absence of a define structure had impeded the development of Nollywood into becoming the best of business.
“We need the government to establish policies that will facilitate and help us tell our stories the way we want to tell.
“We practitioners need to set structure; we are the people that wear the shoe and know where it hurts. Let the government establish policies to facilitate our development.
“Right now, the times are not so good, because almost 50 per cent of films made out of Nollywood do not breakeven; however, the glory is coming soon.
“In fact, in the next five years, I see Nollywood going mainstream; that is why I am telling all the practitioners to position themselves for better days ahead.
“The future of Nollywood is bright. When the government does the needful, we will definitely get to where we are originally supposed to be,’’ he said.
On the movie “Zero Hour’’ he is currently shooting in Abuja, the Kaduna born movie maker and owner of Whitestone Pictures LLC, Lawrenceville, Georgia, U.S. said it was a political thriller.
He disclosed that it was one of those movies that had a lot of intrigues, suspense and would glue the viewer to want to know what happen next to the end.
On relationship with the cast in “Zero Hour’’, the Geology and Mining graduate from the University of Jos said that trust was the underlining factor.
“ Its about trust, there is an exercise we do before we start shooting, I put people behind the actors; the actor may fall on a padded ground or somebody catching him.
“Its an exercise to make them feel from each other’s energy, because film is not a one man’s project, that’s why you never hear me say, I make films instead we make films.
“What I do generally is to keep or `pilot’ the film to a direction, that is why I am called a director,’’ Peters said.
The versatile movie director also said Nollywood made it to the top three in the world because of the originality of contents.
The 2015 best director for Golden Icon Movie Academy Awards for the movie “Affairs of the Heart,’’ call on other film makers to combine our original stories with the latest technology we have.
“Let us be unique in our styles of storytelling.’’
He said in spite of our originality, some film makers in Nollywood tend to copy American movies, “they need to stay on the part that made us great in the first place; our originality.
“When you watch some of our films these days, they are technically better; some look like something shoot in LA, but when you begin to watch it, it is so boring and short.
“So film makers need to do more. If government brings out policies to guard and encourage us to move to the next level, revenue for government will also increase via taxation’’ Peters said.
NAN reports that the movie “Zero Hour’’ as the working title is a blend of Nollywood and Kannywood stars.
The movie has a Northern setting with actors like Richard Mofe Damijo, Alex Ekubo , Ene Oloja of the `Cock Crow at Dawn’, Kannywood diva Rahama Sadau who played Zainab and many others (NAN)
CMY/AAB/EAL
=========
Edited By Adeboye Ajayi/Ekemini Ladejobi