6th June, 2014
Funsho Arogundade
Ace filmmaker, Tunde Kelani has made a passionate appeal to the Director General of the National Film and Video Censors Board, NFVCB to approve with immediate effect the screening of the multi-million dollar film, ‘Half Of A Yellow Sun’ in Nigerian cinemas.
In a Twitter message posted on Thursday, 5 June, the popular film maker via his Twitter handle, @tkelani, TK, as the cinematographer is fondly called, appealed to the censors board to do the needful since information has it that all the necessary security agencies had given their approval after seeing the movie.
TK’s full tweet reads: “This is an appeal to the DG of the National Film and Video Censors Board to release the film Half Of A Yellow Sun to the Nigerian public without further delay.
“Chimamanda Adichie on BBC programme, HardTalk yesterday revealed that HOAYS is not political but a beautiful love story. We understand that the film is already awarded classification and has been cleared by appropriate security agencies. Nigeria cannot afford another round of negative press and global condemnation before taking action. Please madam let’s do the right thing at the right time.”
There have been a lot of issues surrounding the release date of the big budget movie, Half of A Yellow Sun. Its premiere date was first fixed for Friday 25 April but it was changed to 2 May and then indefinitely due to non-classification by the censors board over alleged scenes that could be inciteful and too erotic.
Half of a Yellow Sun, which cost the producers over $10 million to produce, boasts an incredible ensemble including Academy Award nominee Chiwetel Ejiofor, British actress Thandie Newton, Nollywood superstar Genevieve Nnaji as well as veteran singer/actress Onyeka Onwenu, Zack Orji, OC Ukeje, and Anika Noni Rose. It was directed by Biyi Bandele.