It's one of the biggest film production centres in the world, producing over 200 movies a month, yet Nigeria struggles to get its cinema seen outside Africa. Now an $8M investment from hedge fund Tiger Global, partnering with Nigerian company iROKU, could be about to change all that.
$8M might not sound like much given the budgets of films made in the West, but the average budget of a Nollywood hit is just $20K and the cost of distribution is much reduced by using the internet rather than burning and packaging DVDs. iROKU director Jason Njoku believes the time is now right for streaming and downloading to move Nollywood products into the UK market.
Nigerian films often deal with religious themes but the country also produces a significant quantity of action movies, cop dramas, family melodramas and horror films.
