Nollywood: Funding, challenge to quality production —Ovbiagele

A Film Producer, Desmond Ovbiagele has sasid that one of the challenges militating against production of quality films in Nollywood is the dearth of funds.

Ovbiagele, speaking to the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Lagos, urged corporate organisations to support film making by partnering with Nollywood to subsidise the cost of production.

According to him, the role of government in supporting the development of Nollywood lay in creating a favourable environment that would help facilitate quality movie production.

“Right now, Nollywood filmmakers are faced with the challenge of accessing funding that will enable them to compete favourably in the global marketplace.

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“There is a minimum level of investment in terms of funding required to be able to compete effectively with our contemporaries such as Hollywood and Bollywood.

“The government typically is not meant to be an investor but to facilitate film making either by giving tax breaks, tax credit or grants to movie producers,” the producer said.

According to him, the quantity of films produced in Nollywood amounted to about 2,000 titles annually behind only Bollywood, which he described as an impressive performance.

Ovbiagele, however, said in terms of revenue, those 2,000 titles would just be a fraction of what Hollywood would make with a much smaller number of films.

“So, films in Nollywood are not just making that much money compared with films from Hollywood but we are trying to change that by investing more money in the creation of films.

“Nollywood has done fantastically well over the last decades and it is popular in Africa and other parts of the world,” the film maker said.

Ovbiagele said that Nollywood had evolved over the years by making the transition from producing films on video tapes and compact discs to now being shown on cinema screens and cable television.

“Nollywood has realised that it needs to up its game in terms of production quality of its films in other to stand shoulder to shoulder with its contemporaries abroad.

“The government has tried to support Nollywood in this regard but much more needs to be done considerably to really make an impact in the development of Nollywood,” he said.

Ovbiagele said that the advent of other windows for recouping films has reduced reliance on putting films on DVD which had also led to a reduction in piracy.

“Piracy has gone down considerably so the impact of piracy is not as great as it was in the past in terms of affecting investment,” he said.

Ovbiagele said that Nollywood was an industry which generated a considerable amount of employment opportunities for youths, therefore deserved the attention of government and corporate bodies.