Inside the Nigerian Filmmaking Collective Endorsed by J.J. Abrams and Franklin Leonard

This is just an awesome story and includes my Q&A with this talented group of young filmmakers.

Sometimes the world just utterly surprises you. Last spring, Franklin Leonard, founder and CEO of the Black List, did a Zoom Q&A with the DePaul University MFA in Screenwriting cohort (Class 2021). During that inspiring one-hour conversation, he mentioned a group of young filmmakers in Nigeria who he had connected with. They call themselves The Critics. Curious, I checked out their site on YouTube and found this short film:

I looked them up on Twitter. Sure enough, they where there.

Lo and behold, they already followed me on Twitter. I sent them a message asking if they’d be open to a Q&A. They got right back to me, then after a few more exchanges, they sent this note:

Just remembered watching Episodes of Film Courage on YouTube where you spoke on Screen Writing Sometime back last year! Those videos are the reason am going into script/screenwriting lol

So this is how the thing went. Franklin Leonard is in Los Angeles. He does a Zoom session with my students in Chicago. He had already connected with these young filmmakers in Nigeria. I looked them up and discovered they followed me on Twitter. Plus, they had seen a video interview I had done in L.A. which inspired one of them to become a screenwriter.

It is, indeed, a small world.

I reached out to The Critics with some questions. That interview is below. But first, more recent news. This week, the Hollywood Reporter featured this article:

A group of Nigerian teens and self-proclaimed movie buffs used to spend “hours and hours” doing a typical cinephile activity: gushing about the great movies they loved and criticizing the ones they loathed.

They paid particular attention to Nollywood, Nigeria’s version of Hollywood, but eventually got fed up over the “lack of adventure and the incessant repetition of storyline,” explains Raymond Yusuf of the decision to take matters into their own hands, literally, and form a filmmaking collective aptly titled The Critics Company.

Based in Kaduna, Nigeria, and launched more than five years ago, the group has expanded and now includes 10 members ages 6 to 20 (most of whom are siblings or cousins). There are seven young men: Raymond Yusuf, Lawson Titus, Godwin Gaza Josiah, Victor Josiah, Ronald Yusuf, Richard Yusuf and Ridwan Abdullateef; and three young women: Rejoice Josiah, Raechel Ken and Raechel Yusuf.

Together, they taught themselves to make films using YouTube tutorials on how to experiment with greenscreens and special effects, skills they put to use crafting sci-fi-heavy short films. After posting the clips on YouTube, The Critics Company garnered media attention that eventually caught the eye of The Black List founder and Hollywood insider Franklin Leonard, who, when he likes what he sees, is often a most influential and enthusiastic cheerleader.

Leonard tipped off J.J. Abrams, and the filmmaker was so in awe of what he saw that he rallied Bad Robot’s resourceful Kate Webster to help send the team a crate chock-full of filmmaking essentials and gear to keep making their art. Reached by THR, Abrams expressed his gratitude to Leonard for shining a spotlight on the “brilliant, inventive” creators. “They already have the important stuff: talent, determination and huge hearts,” Abrams said. “Getting them some additional gear was just adding fuel to their awesome fire.”

What a wonderful development in the lives of these young storytellers. Here is my Q&A with them:

Scott: What exactly is The Critics?

The Critics: The Critics is a collective group of young Nigerian Filmmakers from Kaduna, Nigeria.

Scott: You could have taken up football or some other more common activity for youth your age, but you decided you want to focus on making movies. What is about movies which attracted you?

The Critics: Starting up as The Critics company we were 5 in number all cousins, meeting officially for the first time back in 2012. We realized we were all movie buffs. We spent days discussing movies and criticizing them, highlighting what we felt should have been done better and others we felt were just perfect.

The urge to recreate the movies we watched grew the more we met and talked. Particularly always fascinated by VFX in films and how realistic they looked on the TV screens. We wanted to also do films with VFX.

Scott: How many members do you have in The Critics and what are your age ranges?

The Critics: Originally, five. We’ve presently grown into a team of ten. Godwin Gaza Josiah — 19 years old, Victor Dahilo Josiah — 16 years old, Rejoice Yemilo Josiah — 12 years old, Raymond Joseph Yusuff — 17 years old, Ronald Joel Yusuff — 16 years old, Richard Yusuff — 14 years old, Lawson Titus — 17 years old.

Scott: You like to make science fiction movies. Why?

The Critics: We like to make Science Fiction films because it has been our aim from the very beginning to create films that are not being created over here in Nigeria. The Use of VFX in Nigerian Films is extremely low. We aim to change that narrative and tell Sci-Fi films in a Nigerian and African themed manner.

Scott: As of summer 2019, you had produced twenty 10-minute-long movies. How often do you finish a movie? Where do you make your movies available to the public?

The Critics: Starting out, we literally film and edit with our phones within a day or two. We progressed to editing on a laptop and automatically in the process began shooting short films with higher length durations. Our highest so far is Z the Beginning which is approximately 10 min. We upload them to our YouTube channel and other social media.

Scott: Franklin Leonard, who founded the Black List in Hollywood, reached out to you. What was that like and has his involvement helped you as filmmakers?

The Critics: Franklin Leonard reaching out to us was surreal and unbelievable. His involvement has helped us quite a lot with his influence connected us to so many big names in the film industry, he has being a very good friend and we still keep close contact.

Scott: What other influential people have you met as a result of your filmmaking notoriety?

The Critics:: JJ Abrams re-posted our work and showed in interest in supporting us. We got to chat with Ava DuVerney, Ryan Connolly, and Olivia Wilde on Twitter. Over the course of the months, we have gotten invites to some big industry meet-ups over here in Nigeria. An example is Teffest the Convener. Omotola Jalade is a well-known figure in the Nigerian Film Scene, Kemi Adetiba our Mentor and a whole lot more.

Scott: What is your filmmaking process like from story concept to final edited project?

The Critics: It’s basically the same for most projects we work on. When we get the idea we want to work on, we shortlist and plan but most times we don’t let the shortlist entirely guide how we shoot the project. Most twists and reveals on our short films, we don’t plan, they come at the very last minute and then we just include it. Then we go out to shoot and lastly head to post production. Recently how we shoot has changed quite a bit. The last project we shot for the first time had a full script. It was a fun experience writing the script and taking this new approach. It helped a lot and we can’t wait to show this project to the world.

Scott: What are your goals as filmmakers, i.e., where do you see yourselves 10 years from now?

The Critics: We see ourselves doing what we’ve always been doing, creating, but obviously with bigger budgets. We hope to grow into becoming one of the biggest production companies in Nigeria.

And lastly, contribute to increasing the percentage of VFX used in films over here.

Scott: What advice do you have for young filmmakers?

The Critics: Firstly, you don’t really need what you don’t have to make a film or pull off an idea, you can never get everything right. It’s okay to suck sometimes. Someday your failures and wins will inspire a young filmmaker like you. And lastly please just keep creating.

Here is the most audacious short film The Critics have created which took seven months to produce:

The Critics are a bright spot in a tumultuous world. Reach out to them and let them know you support their creative efforts.

INSTAGRAM: @thecritics001

TWITTER: @thecritics001

FACEBOOK: The Critics

YouTube: Critics Company

For the rest of the Hollywood Reporter article, go here.

For 100s more interviews with screenwriters and filmmakers, go here.