Nollywood Takes Center Stage At The Toronto International Film Festival
The commercial capital of Nigeria has been chosen as part of the 'City to City' programme. Each year a city is selected and filmmakers living and working there are showcased.
Previous featured cities include; London, Mumbai and Seoul, this year eight Nigerian films will be screened. "Lagos is entirely unique," said Cameron Bailey the programme curator in a statement.
"The city of Fela Kuti's music has also given birth to one of the world's most vibrant film industries."
"The 1,000 low-budget features 'Nollywood' produces each year generate about $1 billion in box office. Now, from that commercial hotbed, a new generation of filmmakers is emerging to both advance and challenge Nollywood."
For TIFF International Rising Star, Somkele Iyamah-Idhalama, global recognition of the world's second largest film industry has been a long time coming.
"It's about time for Nollywood to start getting the right attention," the actress told CNN.
"I know our movies get exported, but it almost seemed like it's because we have [Nigerian] immigrants in different parts of the world. It was still our audience demanding for it. But now a huge film festival like TIFF, this isn't just Africans in Canada.''
In addition to the recognition, Iyamah-Idhalama, hopes the films will showcase the wide range of Nigerian storytelling and change perceptions about Nigerians.
"A movie like '93 Days' is talking about Ebola and heroism in Nigeria. It's almost an oxymoron; Nigeria and heroes," she said.
"We're now beginning to tell stories that will motivate the average person to make a difference."
Iyamah-Idhalama, who stars in three of the films featured at TIFF, including '93 Days' and 'The Wedding Party,' started acting in 2012, a time she says the industry started to shift.
"People were beginning to see hope," she explained.
"People were beginning to take the arts more seriously...a lot of things were happening. You could see there was a major shift that was beginning to happen."
Nollywood generates an estimated $600 million a year and is extremely popular at home, but the industry still faces challenges.
"We have grown tremendously," she continued. " [But] we still have a long way to go. There's still a structure that needs to be put in place, we still need to build an ecosystem but we've come a long way."
One of the major challenges facing the industry is piracy, rampant due to weak copyright laws and enforcement.
According to the World Bank for every legitimate copy of a movie sold, nine are pirated, costing the industry billions in revenue.
At a time The 41st Toronto International Film Festival runs September 8 to 18, 2016.
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