Nigerian Teenagers Inspire With Smartphone-Shot Action SciFi
Recently, a story filmmaking from Africa started getting everyone’s attention. Some young Nigerian filmmakers calling themselves The Critics have been producing apocalyptic science fiction with a smartphone. If you think you are battling against the odds to get your film made, take note of the ingenuity employed by these guys.
Their smartphone has a smashed screen. Their tripod is made from a broken microphone stand. They had to save up for a month to buy their fabric green screen.
The Critics, a crew of 8, made their first film Redemption in 2016. They taught themselves how to do VFX by watching YouTube tutorials. A challenge made harder by the frequent internet and power outages in their home base of Kaduna.
“We want to do something crazy, we want to do something great, something that has not been done before, and from what has been going on now, we believe quite well that it is going to happen soon enough.” – Godwin Josiah, The Critics.
By the last count, they had scrimped and saved and improvised their way to 20 short films. You can find their inspiring YouTube channel here.
New resources
From the looks of their last video, they now have some shiny new kit in the form of tripods, lights, a reflector, a gimbal and more. Apparently, after Nollywood director Kemi Adetiba raised awareness of their achievements, folks donated $5,800 to a fundraising campaign.
We can be sure it won’t be wasted.
A few days ago, I wrote in a post that filmmaking is essentially solving a series of “how?” questions. So, to be a filmmaker you need to have a “can do” attitude, as opposed to “I don’t know how”. So no-one can argue that these young filmmakers don’t have what it takes to go all the way.
Z: The Beginning
Their scifi short Z: The Beginning took the The Critics 7 months to film and edit. The stars of the film were also taking up a number of other roles, including stunt coordinator, gaffer, prop master, composer, continuity and so on. This is true guerilla filmmaking, where no obstacle and no job is too big for anyone in the team to take on.
“The main aim was not for our stuff to go viral. We just wanted people to see that okay there are kids in Kaduna doing something different. So that was just the main aim. So it all of a sudden just happening. It blew our mind and it made us happy,” says Godwin Josiah, 19.
Throwback Our First Camera! pic.twitter.com/2FVHNtWdmc
— THE CRITICS WHO RULE (@thecritics001) September 2, 2019
So far, The Critics have had to keep their films short because otherwise they would take too long to upload. But they have high ambitions, saying “One of the targets we aim for in the years to come is to make the biggest film in Nigeria and probably beyond.”
And why not? We say good luck to them and we’ll definitely be keeping an eye on their progress.
What really excites us is how a smartphone (even a broken one) has given an opportunity to young filmmakers with very little resources. The Critics are smart enough to understand this: filmmaking is not about making long kit lists and obsessing over camera specs, it’s actually about answering the “how” questions with a “can do” attitude and plenty of creative innovation.
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