Dimeji Ajibola, the Creative Mind behind Nigeria’s First Musical Thriller Movie. Exclusive Interview and behind the scene footage.

By Awala Bemigho & Adaeze Umolu
Only insight happens when one film maker interviews another. This is exactly what occurred when AllAfricancinema sent filmmaker, Awala Bemigho on a fact finding mission behind the creative engine of the latest movie getting the buzz everywhere HoodRush.  How did this Animator / filmmaker get Nigeria’s best to sing in a movie? What exactly was he thinking when he decided to tackle the not so common musical film genre?  Read the interview below.
Dimeji Ajibola, is the technical director at flipsyde studios. He is also the writer producer, director, of the new movie Hoodrush. Awala caught up with him at his studio in Lagos, Nigeria.
Awala: What kind of background are you coming from?
Dimeji: I come from a background of traditional art because when I was growing up I discovered my talent for illustration. I do a lot of illustration and I try to tell my story via illustration. So I developed that aspect of me. But along the line I started training myself in Animation and eventually filmmaking.
Awala: What kind of projects have you done in the past?
Dimeji:  I started working in the advertising. I’ve done a couple of jobs some of the recent ones are MTN where this robot guy is dancing ‘alanta’. I did the animation for that and a couple of other TV commercials like dettol and Chelsea.  I’ve worked for a lot of companies out there including glo, airtel just to name a few. Also I’ve done a couple of short movies they are all online; people can go and watch it, one is titled ‘say cheese’ the other is titled ‘H.O.V’. So these are some of the movies I’ve done and most recently the feature length movie, ‘Hoodrush’
Awala: What pushed you into film Making?
 Dimeji: I’ll say that filmmaking has always been part of me since childhood, it’s just that I didn’t realise. Then I thought it was just art because I realised that what actually motivated me into art was that  I was looking for an avenue to express the story in me and what I could lay my hands on then was my pencil and paper. That was what drove me into art that time, to bring out my stories the best way I could. As time went by I got into animation and I realised that I could actually make my stories move this time around.  So when I had the opportunity to learn filmmaking, I realized that this is the ultimate place to be for story telling. So it has always been part of me, just that I have been going through a phase to reach this stage.
Awala: What are some of the schools you have attended?
Dimeji: I started In Nigeria I attended Yaba College of technology, then I also attended Animation mentor. It’s an online school which the final part of it I did in California, that was in San Francisco. I also attended New York film academy for Filmmaking.
Awala: What was the experience like looking at the educational trajectory from a conventional art school which Yaba college of technology is known for to a school like the New York film academy? How where you able to balance both worlds?
Dimeji: Since I experienced animation, I knew that is the path that I wanted to go. I wanted a situation where I can express my stories in the digital format. Unfortunately there aren’t any schools here that are teaching it to a level that I want to it to be. You should also know that when you are here in Nigeria and you’re working, if you have to go abroad to school it means that everything has to stop; your life has to stop. So with the advent of online school it solved that problem for us. This means you can actually be home and go to school. So when I discovered that I can actually study animation online, which ‘Animation Mentor’ is one of the first really, when they introduced that, I realised that this is just the opportunity for me. This is why I joined it. It’s a course that lasted for two years and after, towards the ending of the school I knew that I will be going to America for my graduation and other project work.  I realised that I could just quickly take a course from New York academy while I’m there but that one is not online (laughs mildly); you have to be on campus for that.
Awala: What’s the story of Hoodrush?
Dimeji: Hoodrush is actually the story of the Nigerian youth. It details the life of two brothers who are trying to make a living through their talent in music but unfortunately for them they find themselves living in the ghetto. They get their daily funds for living via menial jobs. These two guys always attend talent hunt shows to press their luck believing one of these days they will win something credible to help them promote their career in music. But unfortunately for them most of the talent hunt shows they attend are fraudulent where every one is out looking for themselves. One way or the other one of the brothers got fed up and he decided to look for other means to raise funds for their career, which is also what you’d term as not a proper way but he got fed up of looking for alternative options while the other brother felt they should just keep hoping that something good will come. About the time that the other brother got something he thinks can drive their career another hope presents itself so now they have to chose between the devil and the blue sea, let me put it that way. So that’s the story. Let me not spill the beans.
Awala: From this background I can see that your story is steeped in a lot of present day reality stared at the young people. So what was your own inspiration since you borrowed a lot from the happenings of today?
Dimeji: The inspiration also came from my own personal experience, because one way or the other this is how we all came by, hustling, trying to get by, may be we all have one talent then we realise this is what I can do so how do I take this my talent to the next level and along the lines we try different channels. Most of the channels we try they don’t work out, but we just have to keep going. So I realised that in my own personal story my steadfastness to my talent made the way for me so I tried to tell the Nigerian public that if they are steadfast in what they have maybe that’ll probably make a way too.
Awala: Let’s look at the genre in which you tried to project your story; you’ve done a musical thriller. Musical thrillers are not common in these parts. We have thrillers and romantic comedies and all of that, so Why did you try on a musical thriller?
Dimeji: It’s just because I’m trying to merge these genres that I love so much. Naturally I’m a thriller person, and another part of me loves music. I grew up being a music person. I have actually engaged my self in music in the past. I’ve actually recorded songs, I write songs, so music has being my thing as well. It’s just that a lot of people don’t know that part of me. So when the opportunity of making a movie came by, I realised that the first thing to do is a musical movie and then I was like if I’m doing a musical movie what of my other love the thriller. ‘Okay’, I felt that I could merge the two and make a Musical Thriller that’s how the idea came to make a Musical Thriller. The story line will be a thriller based but with musical in it.
Awala: Both genres are somewhat problematic in trying to use. Coming from the background of Sound Of Music, a fantastic musical that we all grew on, to My Fair Lady and all of the great musicals of the past. A lot of young people are sold on thrillers, fast based action and all of that. So when you look at the strength, the challenges that come with those genres individually, how did you manage these two genres in one?
Dimeji: Its really challenging especially in a country where people are not used to that kind of genre. I am just used to picking up challenges. If it’s not challenging enough then you won’t find me in it. When I came up with the idea and I felt this is challenging enough, I realised this is what I want to do because it most task me for me to know that it is good enough to be produced. And I tried as much as possible not to cut corners in the movie. I do everything that is meant to be done. So the first thing is writing the story, and then developing the music that will fit into the storyline, and that alone, developing the music, took us another seven months. For the movie, we wrote the story in 2010 and this is 2012. So it took us some time to produce but its really challenging but it’s what I want, I like taking up challenges.
Awala: I still want to probe further on the challenges. I know when one does musical, you need a musical consultant, people to score for you, musical coaches to make sure that the actors hit their notes, you even have to cast people who can sing. Give us an insight into how you did some of this.
Dimeji: At flipside studios, we are an audio visual outfit. So we own a music studio, with that we meet a lot of music producers they come in to do one or two things with me, and even some artists. From there I met some good producers that I feel I can work with if I want to make a music movie. So when the time came I called a couple of them saying this is what I want to do and I want you to write and produce these songs for me. So we sat down, we discussed the storyline, and the passion, and the emotions that I want in the songs, what I want to feel. Sometimes I gave them some of the phrases and sentences I want in the song so that they don’t completely go out of line. With that they produced a couple of songs, the ones that we didn’t like, we criticized it. They go back,  and make adjustments until we arrived at where we are today. After we produced the songs then we started with the casting. For our main actors, we had to cast people who can sing. That was the challenge because I don’t know any actors who can sing but I know there are good actors. I was just praying that the actors I like can sing. A couple of them can some of them cannot, so for those who cannot we had to drop them. And some of them can sing and they can act. It’s a challenge trying to find actors who can do both but eventually the five major actors of the movie they can all act and sing.
Awala: Who were the guys you considered at first?
D: O.C. Ukeje I considered him first. I didn’t know that he could sing until I asked him  and he laughed, and he was like ‘Hey, singing is part of me.’ So when he sang for me, I was like ‘thank God’, Then Gabriel Afolayan too. All these guys I didn’t know they sing. But Gabriel Afolayan even has a single out right now so he also sings. Then Bimbo Akintola, Infact that was the biggest challenge for me casting for Bimbo’s role because I was like if I can get the young boys to sing what about our old timers. So when I met Bimbo and she sang for me, I was like ‘good’, I believe my cast is complete.
Awala: Production challenges, what was the experience like for you?
Dimeji: The major challenge we had was during our preproduction, we got this guy to do our location for us and this guys goes around, takes pictures for us so that we can select. He gets paid for this so he charged us for the location and everything we want. You won’t believe that this guy didn’t show up, all our locations and everything, he took the money and he defrauded us. We had to get on set and start improvising, getting location   again and paying for it, that was our major challenge because while we are on production we were doing recce again. And the guy is still operating right now in Nollywood.  He is a popular Nollywood location person and he is still out there working for people on location.
Awala: As a first time director on a feature length film, what was your experience like?
Dimeji: Wow! Let’s say the first thing that came to my mind was that this is totally different from everything else I’ve done. I thought ‘okay’ I have shot commercials, I’ve shot short films, but a feature length movie is different, it’s totally different. In terms of management, because I also produced it, it was really tasking for me and I was also executive producer. While I’m thinking of the creative, I’m also thinking of how to  disburse  money, make sure I’m on everybody, the other crew members,  to make sure they do their work. Because there was a time we had some problems on set because of lack of communications, so those are the things we had to manage.  Feature length movies is tasking because even though I did two short films to prepare myself but even that did not prepare me for the challenges. Then apart from the production itself, the post–production phase is another aspect. It’s a long movie so you have to edit, do so many things to get a lot of things right, even during post-production you realise that there was some shots we lost, we shoot them and we lost them, because we shoot onto hard disk because we shoot on HD. We lost some shots that were really crucial we just had to find a way that it would not affect the project. Let’s just say thank God we were using multiple cameras. Some cameras had some of those shots but we lost the camera with the main shots. Also managing people on set is crazy some people didn’t know how hard it was. You  know a lot of people are willing to work, they say ‘lets do this’ but once they get on set you see them start breaking down they start to lose morale. You just have to keep up with everybody to make sure we finish this project. For them this is my own first feature length movie they are not used to working with someone like me. Because you know Nollywood is used to doing everything ‘sharp sharp’ and must of them are  used to working in that background. So when they come and we had so many takes like ten times, imagine doing all that multiple takes for a month, a lot of people’s morale dropped but I had to keep them going on till we finished.
Awala: Why should people go to the Cinema to see Hoodrush?
Dimeji: There are many reasons. Number one it’s something different. Hoodrush attempts to answer the yearnings of most Nigerians. They want to see something different and we are using hoodrush to present that opportunity to Nigerians. They are kind of tired of the normal Nollywood, wall to wall, everything-is-in-door kind of story.  Let’s take people outside, let’s take the risk so people can actually go and see what they are craving for in the Nigerian movie industry. And it’s also a musical, a lot of beautiful music, beautiful storyline. It is basically the story of the Nigerian youth so I guess this is also a story for them.
Awala: What are your next steps?
Dimeji: I am hoping that hoodrush brings back some of the money spent on it, because we have started writing the story for our next movie which is going to be an action thriller.  I am going back to where I should be (laughs). I’m using hoodrush to fulfil my childhood fantasy.
Awala: What’s your take on the industry generally?
D: I think a lot of people are beginning to understand the need for quality in the industry.   People are taking steps towards producing quality movies and if the trend continues I know that the movie industry will definitely improve. There’ll be more money in the industry and people will get better pay. I’m hoping this trend continues so that more people, more investors will get interested in the movie industry. And if the quality improves, people will be willing to go and see a movie.
Awala: One of the biggest challenges confronting the industry is distribution, what’s the plan?
Dimeji: Right now I’m just focusing on the cinema distribution so maybe when I get to the DVD ‘level’ I’ll start showing  more concern because that area is more porous; because   it gets into the hands of the public and then that’s where you see anything begins to happen. But at this stage we are focusing on cinema release and the protection of the movie is strict so I’m not worrying right now.
Awala: Finally, who are your inspirations as a filmmaker? Whose styles’ do you like?
D: I like Quentin Tarantino‘s style, because his style of movie is different, he doesn’t give a damn about what people say he just does it the way he likes, Especially what he did with  ‘From Dusk Till Dawn’. The other director I really admire is the way he does his thing is James Cameron. He is some one that has taken film making to another level and for me if a single person can dream of something and achieve it, it’s such an inspiration for others to emulate. So for me Jim Cameron is an icon his someone I want to be like. The other person I admire is Jeta Amata, I like him because his somebody that is pushing the Nollywood industry to the level where it should be. He is constantly pursuing quality and that I admire about him.
Awala: Thank you for your time
D: You’re welcome.
To Watch Dimeji’s movies Saycheese follow this link http://allafricancinema.com/say-cheese/
To watch Dimeji’s Movie H.O.V. follow this link http://allafricancinema.com/history-of-violence-h-o-v/
To watch the trailer of Hoodrush follow this link http://allafricancinema.com/hoodrush-the-movie/
Hoodrush premieres on the 12th of October 2012, at the Silverbird Galleria in Victoria Island, Lagos and will also be released that same day in all cinemas in Lagos, PortHarcourt, Abuja and AkwaIbom.
Adaeze is a creative writer with special interest in African Cinema, some of her articles are published on  allafricancinema.com & informationnigeria.org. Awala is a film maker with 316 Media. He has a special love for documentaries. Follow  this link http://allafricancinema.com/making-a-difference-rekindling-hope/ to watch one of his documentaries.