After Carthage Film Festival, The Man Died sets for Egypt, Jo’Burg, FESPACO

• Wins awards at AFRIFF, ENIFF
After yesterday’s screening at the Cartharge Film Festival, which began on November 14, and ends December 21 in Tunisia, the ward-winning film, The Man Died, a feature film inspired by Wole Soyinka’s prison notes of same title, continues its global tour in January.

The film, continues to garner global critical acclaims, and is already programmed for Luxor International film Festival, Egypt in January; Jo’Burg Film Festival, SA (February); African Film Festival, New York, US (March), and FESPACO in Burkina Faso (March), among others. This is as it is also being reviewed by at least three major global streaming platforms, and international distribution channels.

It is also being considered for special screenings at educational institutions in Florence, Italy; Abu Dhabi in the UAE; Jo’Burg, South Africa as well at Harvard University, Oxford University, and at Ithaca College, all in the USA, among others.

The film was screened at L’Opera Cinema on Sunday, December 15; at ABC on Monday, 16 and at Amilcar on the 17 — to a diverse audience of international festival attendees and the local audiences.

Founded in 1966, Carthage Film Festival (Journées cinématographiques de Carthage, or JCC), one of the oldest film festivals in the world, is renowned for attracting large casts of the best of global cinema family. It is reputed to champion the cause of African and Arab countries and enhancing Global South cinema in general.

Organised by a committee peopled by professionals of the cinema industry, chaired by the Tunisian Ministry of Culture, the festival which began as a biennial, alternating with the Carthage Theatre Festival, became an annual event in 2014. Its main prize is the Golden Tanit named after the Carthaginian goddess Tanit. The 2024 festival is directed by Sonia Chamkhi, who has been on the seat since 2022.

Though yet to be officially released to the market, The Man Died, which since its “special-premiere” in July in Lagos to mark the Nobel laureate dramatist, poet, essayist and human/civil rights activist, Soyinka’s 90th birthday, has already won two awards – Best Screenplay Award at the 2024 African International Film Festival, AFRIFF, (November) and; Best Audience Choice Award at the Eastern Nigeria International Film Festival, ENIFF.

Written by London-United Kingdom-based Bode Asiyanbi, directed by New York-US and Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates-based Awam Amkpa and produced by Lagos, Nigeria-based Femi Odugbemi for Zuri24 Media, The Man Died stars a coterie of renowned names on the Nigerian screen, including Wale Ojo as Wole, Sam Dede as Yisa, Norbert Young (Prison Superintendent), Francis Onwochei (Prison Controller and Edmund Enaibe as Commissioner; and international actors, London-UK-based Christiana Oshunniyi (Laide Soyinka), and Los Angeles, USA-based Abraham Awam-Amkpa (Johnson), among others.

The Man Died is the story of Wole Soyinka’s 27 months incarceration by the Nigerian government in 1967 at the cusp of the civil war. He was famously seeking a truce between Biafra and the Federal Government to allow time for a negotiated settlement of the conflict.