AMAA, Cuban Int’l Film School, To Train Aspiring Filmmakers In Kigali

The awards will hold on October 20 at the Raddison Blu Hotel & Convention Centre and an Africa Cinema Business Roundtable will hold as a sideline event where focus will be on content distribution with the theme, “Unblocking Distributions: The Key to the Success of African Cinema.”

Peace Anyiam-Osigwe, MFR, the founder of the continental awards organisation has been one of the leading voices on the African Cinema over the years according to a statement signed by Tony Anih, Director of Administration.

“A lot of people already know that Peace Anyiam-Osigwe has the agenda of making the African Cinema more acceptable, the world over, some of the big films that have won the AMA Awards in previous editions include: Viva Riva, October 1, The Figurine, Eye of the Storm, Run, I sing of a Well, How to Steal 2 Million, Rising Moon, Of Good Report and lots more. And these films made very successful runs at international film festivals and were also box office hits across markets in Africa, Europe and the United States.”

The Africa film Academy has trained of 10,000 film makers  across Africa and continues to do so with the support of the Osigwe Anyiam-Osigwe foundation and other partners.

Key resource persons that will take classes at the workshop include Rebecca Roos, guest lecturer at EICTV who  will focus on visual story telling for both fiction and documentary films.

The intensive workshop will entail theoretical basics and practical exercises, pitching and the production of a few short films.

An Animation class will be presented by Edward Lapang, Nigerian animator, painter and motion graphics artist. His goals are to place an emphasis on the creation of quality animation and special effects in the African film and television productions.

It is important to note that, The International Film and Television School Cuba (EICTV), Cuba’s world renowned International Film and Television School (EICTV) was founded by a group of intellectuals, led by Columbian writer Gabriel García Márquez, Argentinian poet Fernando Birri and Cuban filmmaker Julio García Espinosa, leading figures in Latin American debates about revolutionary and politically committed art.

Its initial aim was to support the development of national audio-visual industries in countries that lacked the infrastructure or resources to train their own professionals.

Representatives from the film school will present certificates to the students that complete the workshop and will also take part in round table discussions sharing their knowledge in how to train filmmakers within an industry that lacks infrastructure.

The film school has attracted many renowned international filmmakers as visiting teachers for master classes and workshops that include Werner Hertzog, Francis Ford Copolla and Stephen Spielberg.

The film school has  maintained its objective: to train artists of a high aesthetic and technical level with an ethical concept, capacity for dreaming, critical vision of the world, deep concern and positive position against injustice and oppression.

As part of its core mission the AFA uses the medium of filmmaking as a tool for community development to train aspiring artists in all aspects of filmmaking: acting, writing, directing and producing motion pictures all across Africa.

As an annual celebration of the brightest and the best in African movies, the AFA hosts the Africa Movie Academy Awards (AMAA) which is the biggest gathering of movie makers across Africa and the Diaspora.