Portal:African cinema/Selected birthdays

Selected birthdays list

---

Draft:Portal:African cinema/Selected_birthdays/3

Blitz Bazawule

Raja Amari (b. 4 April, 1971) is an award-winning Tunisian film director and scriptwriter whose works often center on female protagonists. Her best-known films include Red Satin (2002), Foreign Body (2016) and Buried Secrets (2016). Her most recent film is the documentary “She Had a Dream” (2020) which follows a Black Tunisian activist running for office in the 2019 legislative elections. In addressing the issue of racism and sexism in contemporary Tunisia in the film, Amari said “I also wanted to tell the story of Black women in Tunisia, because I felt they are somehow forgotten.”

Nabil Ayouch (b. 1 April, 1969) is a French-Moroccan director, screenwriter and producer.  His films include Horses of God (2012) a drama about the 2003 Casablanca bombings and Morocco’s submission for the Best International Film at the Oscars, and Casablanca Beats (2021) centered around a group of young Moroccans who find their passion in hip-hop. It was the first Moroccan film to compete for a Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival. In 2022, The Blue Caftan which he co-wrote with his director-wife Maryam Touzani was shortlisted for Best International Feature Film at the 95th Academy Awards.

Samuel Bazawule (b, 19 April 1982), known professionally as Blitz Bazawule and Blitz the Ambassador, is a Ghanaian filmmaker, author, visual artist, rapper, singer-songwriter, and record producer. Blitz made his debut as a film director debut with The Burial of Kojo (2018), which won Best First Feature Film by a Director at the 15th Africa Movie Academy Awards and the Grand Nile Prize at the Luxor African Film Festival.  He directed the musical film adaptation The Color Purple in 2023 and is currently developing a six-episode miniseries based on his novel The Scent of Burnt Flowers about an African American fugitive couple seeking refuge in Ghana.

---

Draft:Portal:African cinema/Selected_birthdays/5

Souleymane Cissé

Robert Anengo  (b. April 22, 1986) is a Kenyan actor and casting director who is best known for his role in the TV series, Kona. He featured in Chiwetel Ejiofor’s critically acclaimed film, The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind (2020) which premiered at the 2019 Sundance Film Festival. He earned a nomination for Best Actor in a Leading Role at the 2020 AMAA Awards for his role in 40 Sticks (2020).

Gaston Kaboré (b. 23 April 1956) is a Burkinabe director and important figure in the Burkina Faso film industry. In 1997, he was awarded an Etalon d’Or at the Pan-African Festival of Cinema and Television of Ouagadougou (FESPACO) for Buud Yam, a historical film drawing on African oral tradition. The film’s sequel, Wênd Kûuni won the 1985 César Award for best Francophone film.  An advocate for strengthening capacity in the African audiovisual industry, in 2003 he founded the Imagine Institute based in Ouagadougou, a training school for film and television professionals.

Souleymane Cissé (b. April 21 1940) is a Malian film director regarded as one Africa’s most influential filmmakers.. His films explore themes of tradition, modernity, and the clash between rural and urban life in Africa. His 1987 film, Yeelen based on a legend told by the Bambara people, which has been called “conceivably the greatest African film ever made”, won the Jury Prize at the 1987 Cannes Film Festival, becoming the first African film to win a prize in the festival's history. His other notable productions include Baara (1978), Waati (1995) and Tell Me Who You Are (2009).

Kagiso Lediga (b. May 6, 1978) is a South African comedian, actor and filmmaker who first came to fame for his television comedies such as The Pure Monate Show and the Late Nite News with Loyiso Gola. He made his first feature film, Matwetwe, a coming-of-age drama and the romantic comedy, Catching Feeling, the first South African film to stream globally on Netflx. Lediga’s next project was the Netflix crime drama series Queen Sono about a secret agent secret South African clandestine agent who tackles criminal operations while dealing with crises in her personal life.

Mildred Okwo (b. 29 April, 1966) is a Nigerian film director and producer. Her filmography includes 30 Days (2016), The Meeting (2012) Suru L’ere (2016) and La Femme Anjola (2019) an African neo-noir crime thriller and most recent film. The film earned her her fourth AMVCA nomination, this time for best picture. She is also co-founder of the Nigerian Oscars Selection Committee which screens Nigerian films to be submitted for the Best Foreign Language Film category at the Academy awards.

---

---

---

---

---

---

---

---

---

---

---

Draft:Portal:African cinema/Selected_birthdays/27 Test

---

---

---

---

---

---

---

Draft:Portal:African cinema/Selected_birthdays/41

Isaac Godfrey Geoffrey, 6 November, director of Bad Black and the cult classic Who Killed Captain Alex?

Toke Makinwa Actress, 3, November

8 November, 1985, Keira Hewatch

9 November, 1976, Joseph Benjamin

11 November, 1991, Lilian Afegbai

11 November, 1960, Christy Essien-Igbokwe

11 November, 1986, Uzee Usman

13 November, 1984, Annie Macaulay-Idibia

17 November, 1978, Nonso Anozie

20 November, 1942, Justus Esiri

21 November, 1957, Ashley Nwosu

23 November, 1961, Dele Odule

26 November, 1988, Halima Atete

28 November, 1988, Stephanie Coker

---

Draft:Portal:African cinema/Selected_birthdays/43

Niyi Akinmolayan (b. 3 November) is a Nigerian filmmaker best known for directing Nollywood blockbuster, The Wedding Party 2, and as Founder and Creative Director of Anthill Studios. In January 2022,  Anthill Studios inked a multi-year worldwide license arrangement with Amazon Prime Video.

Isaac Godfrey Geoffrey aka IGG Nabwana, (b. 6 November), is a Director dubbed the “Quentin Tarantino of Uganda” and founder of Wakaliwood the studio behind low-budget action films such as Bad Black and the cult classic Who Killed Captain Alex?

---

Draft:Portal:African cinema/Selected_birthdays/45

Thandie Newton

Thandiwe Newton, (b. 7 November 1972) is a British-Zimbabwean actress who currently stars in the HBO science fiction-western series Westworld. Her filmography includes a starring role in Half a Yellow Sun, based on the novel of the same name by Nigerian author Chimanada Ngozi Adichie and Liyana, an animated Swazi documentary film that tells the personal narratives of five orphaned children growing up in Swaziland. It won the best documentary prize at the 2017 LA Film Festival,

Karim Amer (b. 10 Nov 1983) is an Egyptian-American film producer and director. He worked on The Square (2013) which depicts the Egyptian Crisis until 2013, starting with the Egyptian Revolution of 2011 at Tahrir Square, and The Great Hack (2019).  The Square was the first Egyptian film to earn an Academy Award nomination and went on to win three Emmy Awards, while The Great Hack got nominated for an Emmy and a BAFTA Award.

Michael Wawuyo Sr  (b. 11 Nov 1948) is a Ugandan actor and special effects artist. He is known for his big screen roles on Last King of Scotland, Kony: Order from Above, The Only Son, Sometimes in Apriland The Mercy of the Jungle. A also did work as a special effects and make-up artist on films that include The Felista's Fable, for which he received his first nomination at the 2nd Africa Magic Viewers' Choice Awards in 2014, The Mercy of the Jungle, and Imbabazi: The Pardon (2013).

Charmaine Bingwa (b. 13 Nov 1984) is a Zimbabwean-Australian actress principally known for her role as Carmen Moyo in The Good Fight TV series. Her upcoming projects include the epic Emancipation alongside Will Smith and as the warrior Isisa in the King Shaka Showtime TV series (filming in 2022) co-starring Aïssa Maïga, Thapelo Mokoena and Warren Masemola.

---

Draft:Portal:African cinema/Selected_birthdays/47 This is a test

---

Draft:Portal:African cinema/Selected_birthdays/49

Abdellatif Kechiche

Abdellatif Kechiche (b. 7 December 1960) is a Tunisian-French actor, director and screenwriter. He made his directorial debut with the award-winning 2000 Poetical Refugee drama about a young North African who immigrates illegally to France. Among the eight awards it received was the Venice Film Festival Luigi De Laurentiis Award for Best Debut Film. Kechiche is the recipient of several César Awards and in 2013 of the Palme d’Or, Cannes Film Festival's highest honor, for Blue Is the Warmest Colour.

Suhaib Gasmelbari (b. 17 December 1979) is a Sudanese film director, screenwriter, and cinematographer known for the 2019 documentaryTalking About Trees. Filmed clandestinely, the film follows the efforts of the Sudanese Film Group, comprised of a group of veteran filmmakers, to reopen an outdoor movie theater in the city of Omdurman in the face of decades of Islamist censorship. It received wide acclaim and numerous awards including the FIPRESCI Prize at the International Istanbul Film Festival, Tanit d'or at the Carthage Film Festival, and the Golden Star at El Gouna Film Festival.

Flora Gomes (b. 31 December 1949) is a Bissau-Guinean film director known for the landmark 1988 film Mortu Nega (Death Denied). Shot fourteen years after independence, Mortu Nega depicts the struggle for independence and the challenges of the first post-independence years in Guinea-Bissau. It was the first fiction film and the second feature film ever made in Guinea-Bissau and won the prestigious Oumarou Ganda Prize at the 1989 FESPACO festival.

---