A romantic comedy about the disasters and joys of a huge
Nigerian wedding is breaking box-office records locally and abroad.
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| Credit: BellaNaija |
The Wedding Party: Destination Dubai, raked in 73.3
million naira (R2.4 million) in its opening weekend on December 15 to 17, a new
record. The sequel to the successful 2016 movie The Wedding Party beat
out Star Wars: The Last Jedi in Nigerian cinemas, which also
opened that weekend. By the first week of January, the film had grossed
300 million naira (R10 million) and went on to open in 17 other African
countries and the UK, where it had the biggest single day opening for a
Nollywood film. Producers now plan to take it to the US, the Middle East and
the Caribbean.
These earnings may seem small compared to the global earning
of blockbusters like The Last Jedi, but it’s significant for
Nigeria and Nollywood.
The country’s film industry is slowly becoming a global phenomenon.
Even though Nollywood pushes out dozens of films a week,
most go straight to DVD, with less than 30 cinemas serving a
population of around 180 million.
The international success is a vindication of sorts. When
the quality of early Nollywood films was derided, its advocates argued that its
shaky cameras and popping mics were laying a foundation for a professional
homegrown film industry. The box-office records broken by The Wedding Party’s
sequel, as well as the first film, justify that faith.
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| Credit: Fab Magazine |
From marketing to the distribution, Ebony Life Films director,
Mo Abudu and the Elfike Film Collective have ensured that the film looks slick
professional—nothing like the chaos of the wedding it portrays.
Bringing humour in more ways than one
Released in December 2016, the original The Wedding Party
was the first Nollywood film to pass the billion-naira mark at home, becoming
the highest grossing Nigerian film ever, at 3.5 billion naira (R141 million).
The film showed a local appetite for well-made rom-coms, fueled by a marketing
campaign that borrowed from Hollywood. Last year, Netflix added The Wedding
Party to its roster.
The film’s sequel was determined to be an international
affair and exactly a year later, The Wedding Party: Destination Dubai was
released. The film picks up at the end of the last one, where a kiss between a
groomsman and a bridesmaid sets sparks flying all the way to a new wedding at the
centre of the film. The culture clash between a Yoruba and Igbo family is
further complicated by the introduction of the bride’s British family to a
destination wedding in Dubai.
Additional records
broken by the movie are:
- Biggest opening day (Friday 15 December) with N20.4 million (R696 000);
- Biggest opening for a PG-rated film;
- Biggest non-holiday opening for a film released in Nigeria;
- Biggest advanced screening total for any Nollywood production, N9.4 million (R320 822).
Source: Ebony Life
Films
The film borrows from the proven novelty of love across the
colour lines first seen in 1967 with Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner.
It also bets on the cinematic hilarity that ensues when people of diverse
ethnicities walk down the aisle, as seen in break US hit My Big Fat Greek Wedding. It taps into the frivolous joy the
wedding film format brings to audiences not accustomed to seeing themselves
celebrated in this way—as Jumping The Broom
did for African-Americans in 2011.
Source: Quartz Media
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