With Don’t Beg Now, QRTV reopens conversation on rape

According to a recent U.N. children’s fund report, one in four boys and one in 10 girls under age 18 are victims of sexual violence. Health experts say more children and young women are coming forward to talk about the problem as the stigma attached to discussing it slowly subsides.  
 
In what seems like a deliberate attempt to reopen and sustain a conversation on rape in Nigeria, Northern Lights Production and QRTV recently produced a short film on rape entitled Don’t Beg Now. The aim is to address the public issue about how victims deal with the stigma, trauma and how the justice system so much shields the offenders.

Speaking at a media session in Lagos, the CEO of ORTV and Executive Producer of the work, Queen Rasheda, informed that her passion for the girl child and women folks in general spurred her to embark on the project that tells a story, as well as enlightens the public on rape.

“Ever since the Busola Dakolo scandal, more and more women have been coming out with the stories of sexual assault, rape, and violence against women. People are actually started to take notice of the menace of rape in our society,” said Queen.

She added: “What we set to achieve with this movie is to let the society understand that rape is not what the victims can just get over. We want people to know that rape can drastically change or outright destroy someone life and people need to understand the gravity of what rape is.”

A three cast short film featuring upcoming talents such as Kuchi Chris, Anthony Umeh, and Sandra Iwajomo, Rola Olawore directed Don’t Beg Now, which graphically showcases the psychological struggles and the years of regrets that the victims are subjected to.

“For those people, who don’t really know what the trauma is, they will get a sense of how a dark topic like rape can switch the character of anybody in the movie Don’t Beg Now. In the short movie, we hope to achieve that,” Olawore said.

The director said their major aim was how to approach the project without stealing away the thunder from the victims and survivors.

“We actually had to interview a whole lot of rape survivors to have a little bit of feel on how to approach the movie. Sincerity is very important to us because of the nature of the topic. We focused on the trauma and what happens after this diabolical event,” he stated. 

Ralo continued; “What we are doing with this project is to highlight the trauma so that even the attacker can think twice before attacking a female to rape her. We are trying to showcase the ugliness of the trauma so that the attacker can think again. We interviewed so many rape victims and survivors. All they wanted was the ultimate result which was the death of their attacker.”

Shot in Lagos with Kuchi Kris playing the lead role as a young girl of about 22, the film project was done in a month, while the script was written in 48 hours.

“This is not my first project; I have been doing this for so long. I buried my head to do this and I don’t think one month is too short to produce a movie. It is a movie I am very proud of because we had so many struggles. Shooting in Nigeria is not the same as shooting in America. Here, you have to deal with the police, deal with area boys and deal with so many issues. I am very thankful to everybody that it finally made it,” said Olawore who also revealed the project is not aimed at making profit but just to teach and enlighten.

Though not available in cinema, Don’t Beg Now is been officially launched on the QRTV Youtube channel for free.