17th October, 2014
Funsho Arogundade/Port Harcourt
Popular Yoruba movie actress, Iyabo Ojo, rising stars Ivie Okujaye and Tope Tedela, were the main attractions of the sixth edition of Best of Nollywood Awards held Thursday night inside the Banquet Hall of Government House, Port Harcourt, Rivers State.
While Ojo’s newest movie which centeres on child abuse, ‘Silence’, emerged the BON Awards’ Best Movie of The Year, Ivie Okujaye and Tope Tedela won the coveted Best Actress and Best Actor in Leading Roles respectively.
Ojo was presented with her gong by Governor Rotimi Amaechi of Rivers State and chief host of the award night.
The excited actress dedicated the award to Almighty God, her cast, crew and all her fans.
The actress’ first daughter, Priscilla Ojo, also emerged the Best Child Actress In Movie with her role in ‘Silence’.
Also on the night’s winners’ list were Femi Jacobs (Dream Walker) and Rita Dominic (The Meeting). They both clinched the Best Supporting Actor and Actress respectively.
Seasoned Yoruba movie actor, Yinka Quadri, won the Best Actor in the leading Role (Yoruba) award, while Ayo Adesanya picked the Best Supporting Actress (Yoruba) honour.
Abdulateef Adedeji and Ijeoma Agu won the Most Promising Actor and Actress; Daniel K Daniel and Linda Ejifor picked Revelation of The Year Male and Female; Olamide Davids’ astounding performance in “Black Silhouette” fetched him the Best Child Actor In Movie award.
In his speech during the award that ended early hours of Friday, Governor Amaechi praised the movie industry players, who he described as “Nigerian Heroes”, for their important role in shaping the social and economic development of Nigeria especially in creating huge employment generation sector.
He said Nollywood was “a product of necessity” due to the fact that the growing unemployment rate forced many to movie locations.
Amaechi, however, said while it was gladdening that many have become successful through that creative endeavour, he enjoined them to look into producing more movies with social message rather than allowing political interest to colour the plot of their production.
“You all started very well in this Nollywood journey, but at a time deviated into the Juju-themed storyline which turned off many. But given the precarious situation of our country now, I will implore you to begin to look into writing script that will be full of social message. You owe the country that duty as her heroes,” Amaechi said.
Earlier, the governor had congratulated this year’s BON Special Recognition Awards recipients: veteran actor Adebayo Salami aka Oga Bello; actress Liz Benson-Ameye; seasoned thespian Nobert Young and legendary Kannywood actor, Kasimu Yaro.
He described them as worthy of the honours.
Other winners were Desmond Elliot, who clinched the Amaka Igwe Director of The Year award with the movie, “Apaye”; Best Kiss In A Movie award went to Majid Michel and Beverly Naya (Forgetting June); Movie with the Best Social Message (Our Difference); Movie with the Best Special Effect (A Mile From Home); Best Use of Make Up (Cobra); Best Use of Food (Being Mrs Elliot); Best Sound (Render To Caeser); Best Production Design (Osunfunke) and Best Short Film (Brave).
Also considered worthy are Best Comedy Movie of the Year (30 Days In Atlanta); Best Cinematography (Apaye); Best Screenplay (Render To Ceaser); Best Documentary (Fatai Rolling Dollar); Best Edited Movie (A Mile From Home); and Best TV Series (Lekki Wives).
Seun Oloketuyi, executive producers of the awards explained that BON Awards has been rewarding those pre-eminent and enterprising talents whose sweat and toil have placed the Nigerian movie industry on the global map of filmmaking, but in spite of some challenges yearly in producing this reward system, the organisers will keep braving the odds to honour this special people.
He revealed that about 150 movies were entered for this year’s edition, 23 of these were short films, while a little over 20 were discovered not to have met some of the terms and conditions of the awards.