Entertainment

Outrage As Lionheart, Nigeria’s first-ever Entry At Oscars Is Disqualified By The Academy

By Mojisola Delano
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Outrage As Lionheart, Nigeria's first-ever Entry At Oscars Is Disqualified By The Academy

Several Nigerians this morning took to social media especially Twitter to express censure over the disqualification of actress Genevieve’s movie Lionheart by the Academy.

The movie was disqualified by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences because it has too many dialogues in English, The Hollywood Reporter states.

Lionheart was directed by Nigerian actor-director Genevieve Nnaji, and the film selected as the country’s selection to compete at Oscars 2020 under the International Feature Film category.

Unfortunately , the movie falls short of one of the Academy’s rules for this category which states,

“An international film is defined as a feature-length motion picture (defined as over 40 minutes) produced outside the United States of America with a predominantly non-English dialogue track.”

Out of its 94-minute runtime, Lionheart has just about 12 minutes of dialogue in Southeastern Nigeria’s native language, Igbo, with the rest of the dialogue spoken in English.

Check out some reactions below:

The however does not prohibit the film from entering any other Oscar categories, including the Best Picture section.

Nnaji has criticised the Academy’s decision to disqualify the film on Twitter, saying that the language in the film represents how Nigerians speak. She adds English acts as a bridge between over 500 languages spoken by Nigerians.

See her tweet  below:

Mojisola Delano 9300 posts 129 comments

Moji is a Lawyer, online media aficionado, communications strategist, and entrepreneur in her early 30’s. Her zest and energy to succeed coupled with her very strong interpersonal skills has seen her build her blog from just a passionate hobby to a strong platform for social influence and brand.

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