{"id":272612,"date":"2011-01-02T14:25:42","date_gmt":"2011-01-02T14:25:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.ghanamma.net\/?p=44317"},"modified":"2011-01-02T14:25:42","modified_gmt":"2011-01-02T14:25:42","slug":"we-ghanaians-first-started-video-production-and-not-nigerians-george-arcton-tettey","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2011\/01\/02\/we-ghanaians-first-started-video-production-and-not-nigerians-george-arcton-tettey\/","title":{"rendered":"We Ghanaians, First Started Video Production And Not Nigerians–George Arcton-Tettey"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>
The stars of New Movie "4Ever Young" Kalsoum Sinare, John Dumelo and Jackie Appiah <\/figcaption><\/figure>
\nFrontline Ghanaian filmmakers say direct to video filmmaking was first done by Ghanaians and not Nigerians as popularly believed.
\n\u201cVideo productions started here in the 80s,\u201d says George Arcton-Tettey, Gama Film company’s Manager Production Services. \u201cIt all started here in the Ghana Film Theatre,\u201d added the Accra-based film director, where he sat watching the shoot of a new television series entitled \u201cChorkor Tro-Tro\u201d.
\nIt was on the premises of TV3, a privately-owned TV station.
\nArcton-Tettey dated the beginning of video production back to the 80s, crediting distribution and exhibition entrepreneur, William Akufo, with pioneering direct-to-video feature production popularly known as home video with his release of Zinabu which was a hit on the theatre circuit and generated sequels because of its popularity.
\n\u201cThe Executive here used to be the place we watched official productions,\u201d he says, referring to a hall on the premises of the Ghana Film theatre. \u201cThere used to be an over-flow of the audience from this theatre here into The Executive.
\nFor testimony, Arcton-Tettey called Akufo by phone. \u201cYes, I started it with Zinabu around 85\/86,\u201d Akufo says. \u201cI went on to shoot Zinabu part 2 and part 3.\u201d
\nAt the time, Arcton-Tettey stresses, the movies were only exhibited in the theatres, not released on video. \u201cApart from Zinabu Akufo went on to produce several others,\u201d he says. \u201cHe now runs a school where he trains filmmakers.\u201d
\n\u201cI have not stopped producing,\u201d Akufo says, \u201cjust that we have to impart the knowledge and experience to the younger ones. Through those productions we realized that we were doing it wrongly. So, we’re training them now.
\nTo further put the Nigerian film industry in its place, Arcton-Tettey speaks about how Nigerian pioneer filmmakers used to come to Ghana to edit and process their movies, listing among those who did, Ola Balogun, Moses Olaiya and Eddie Ugbomah. Even Fela, with his unreleased The Black President whicfh had its sound track burnt in the fire that consumed his \u201cKalakuta Republic\u201d in 1976 during his face-off with Nigeria’s military dictators.
\n\u201cI edited one of Eddie Ugbomah’s films with my boss,\u201d he recalls.\u201d I think that was Boulus 80.\u201d
\nThe decline of production of movies on celluloid, Arcto-Tettey says, came essentially when the Ghana government divested its interests in the publicly-owned Ghana Film Corporation and TV3 bought it up in 1996. \u201cIt became a TV Station and the film production unit became an appendage because TV3’s core business was television broadcasting and production. They then started showing Nigerian films the Nollywood video productions on their channels, That was the beginning of the popularity of Nigerian videos in Ghana. Nigerian films began to sell in the market on VHS and later on VCDs.\u201d
\nInevitably, even established film producers such as Kwah Ansah (Love Brewed in an African Pot, Heritage Africa) had to p[roduce video, his most popular being \u201cHarvest at Seventeen\u201d, a story about teenage pregnancy sponsored by the Ghana Commission on Culture.
\nUnlike the Nigerian movie industry which is generally acknowledged to be experiencing a decline, the Ghanaian video industry, Arcton-Tettey insists, \u201cis very much on the upswing.\u201d
\nHe categorizes the industry into three. \u201cThe first is the group that produces films with Nigerian collaborations. That’s the group that does the typical Ghanaian stories, without western coloration.
\n\u201cThe second is the group of local producers without Nigerian collaborations and their films are very good, too. The third group produces indigenous language movies and it is based in Kumasi. It turns out about five movies every week out of about eitght to ten total production of the Ghanaian film industry per week.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Frontline Ghanaian filmmakers say direct to video filmmaking was first done by Ghanaians and not Nigerians as popularly believed. \u201cVideo productions started here in the 80s,\u201d says George Arcton-Tettey, Gama Film company’s Manager Production Services. \u201cIt all started here in the Ghana Film Theatre,\u201d added the Accra-based film director, where he sat watching the shoot […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-272612","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard"],"yoast_head":"\nWe Ghanaians, First Started Video Production And Not Nigerians-George Arcton-Tettey - Ghanamma.com<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2011\/01\/02\/we-ghanaians-first-started-video-production-and-not-nigerians-george-arcton-tettey\/\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:title\" content=\"We Ghanaians, First Started Video Production And Not Nigerians-George Arcton-Tettey - 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