Chika Anadu's "B for Boy" Wins Two Prizes at 2014 Africa Movie Academy Awards

- May 25, 2014

Emerging young Nigerian filmmaker Chika Anadu, Breakthrough Award winning first feature “B for Boy” won two awards for Best Film In An African Language and Best Film For Women Empowerment Saturday night at the 10th Africa Movie Academy Awards (AMAA) held at the Dr. Gabriel Okara Cultural Centre in Yenagoa, the capital city of Bayelsa state in Nigeria.

"B For Boy" won the 2013 Breakthrough Award with US$5,000 cash prize at the AFI FEST 2013, American Film Institute's annual celebration of international cinema from modern masters and emerging filmmakers.

The realistic contemporary Nigerian drama in Igbo language focuses on the prerogative of the male child in Igbo society and one woman's desperate need for a male child; which reveals the discrimination of women in the names of culture and religion.
Starring Uche Nwadili, Nonso Odogwu, Ngozi Nwaneto and Frances Okeke.

It never occurred to me to make B for Boy in anything other than Igbo. It's a family drama, and we mostly speak Igbo in my family, so it didn't make sense to me to make it in English. My favourite films are in languages I don't understand, and it didn't stop me from enjoying them.

As a filmmaker you make your films with the audience you want to attract in mind. The audience I'm targeting doesn't care about the language spoken in the films they watch. They're interested in more important things like story, performance, cinematography etc.

Nollywood is a genre, and not the entire Nigerian film industry. However none of the 'New wave' of directors in Nigeria would know what was possible without the Nollywood model, so I'm grateful to them for showing us that our stories are of interest to people other than Nigerians. I would describe myself as a filmmaker, period.

~ Quotes from Interview: Chika Anadu On Her Debut 'B for Boy,' Transitioning To Film, Telling 'Women's Stories,' More on http://blogs.indiewire.com/shadowandact/interview-chika-anadu-on-her-debut-b-for-boy-transitioning-to-film-telling-womens-stories-more

Chika Anadu was born in Nigeria in 1980 and attended school in Lagos before heading to the UK in 1997, where she gained her degree in Law and Criminology. She followed up her undergraduate studies with an MA in Africa: Human and Sustainable Development. She has made three short films: Epilogue (2009), AVA (2010) and The Marriage Factor (2013). Chika was one of five winners of the Focus Features Africa First programme in 2010. She took part in the Cinefondation (Cannes Film Festival) Residency programme in 2010/2011, where she worked on her first feature script for the LFF 2013-featured B For Boy.

- See the full list of all the 2014 Africa Movie Awards (AMAA) winners at: http://www.nigeriansreport.com/2014/05/clarion-chukwura-chika-anadu-teco.html#sthash.pxRDmEku.dpuf.