For Damilola Orimogunje, there are many stories the industry isn’t telling. ‘I like to center the human experience in my films; poor healthcare, poor infrastructure, education and more,’ He says. ‘So when you see it, you can see pain, grief, anguish in these stories. You focus on the plot.’
Damilola Orimogunje was late for our interview. In his defence, I was late too; he just happened to show up later than I did. It was the middle of December and we’d been stuck in the ever-present Lagos traffic for a number of hours, exchanging expected arrival times and apologies via text. We were to meet at The Garden in Ikoyi for drinks, where, upon my arrival, there was a party in the outdoor space.
I found a relatively quiet corner and waited, thinking about the person I was about to meet for the first time. Damilola makes grief and pain palpable in his films. Little surprise when For Maria (Ebun Pataki), his 2020 film depicting post-partum depression, hit number one on Netflix Nigeria last year for 16 days. In the short film Losing My Religion, Damilola explored struggling to balance family and faith to the main character’s detriment. In Mo, we see prostitution and human trafficking. When he walks into the restaurant, he stalls, trying to ask a waiter for a young lady who had come in earlier. I wave, but he doesn’t see me yet from behind his dark glasses.
‘I have great news,’ he says as he sits, following with another apology about his timing. Damilola tells me that his new production with debut feature director, Babatunde Apalowo, All the Colors of the World Are Between Black and White, will be premiering at the Berlin International Film Festival 2023 in February. We observe the party outside, joking about joining in and getting free food.
Damilola started his journey armed with a bachelor’s degree in mass communication, but in 2015, he began working with media firms like R2TV, where he tells me he worked as a producer. Between 2016 and 2017, Damilola says he wrote for Africa Magic shows like Flatmates and Hustle. In 2017, his short film, ‘Mo’, won the Best Nollywood Short Film at Real Time Film Festival. In 2018, he directed Losing My Religion and in 2020, he released Heaven Baby and For Maria (Ebun Pataki).
That year, For Maria (Ebun Pataki) premiered at Film Africa and won the Audience Award for Best Narrative Feature. It has been screened in several countries around the world. The film got six nominations at the AMAA awards, including Best Writing and Directing. The film was screened at the 2021 Nollywood Week Film Festival.
In an earlier interview, Damilola said he was moved to tell that story from a Nigerian lens after read a Twitter thread. ‘I realized these things have not been talked about enough,’ he said. ‘Then there is the issue of mental health that people don’t tend to discuss enough and these conversations are important.’
Back in the restaurant, he makes a point of telling me that he became a filmmaker out of boredom and that ‘Dami’ and ‘Orimz’ were separate entities put in place for creative quality control. He explains without elaborating that the defining factor between these entities is that one of them strives to make impactful independent films, ‘like a Nigerian version of A24’. He tells me that he worries about getting in his own way and that he often entertains the idea of declining interviews in the future, like Steve McQueen. I ask him if this—if I’m his last interview; he laughs but says it’s not. Damilola tells me that he’s not as ‘blown’ as he’d like to be but he would like to do interviews that are different from all the others that he had done.
Our full interview continues below.
HILLARY ESSIEN
Abuse, depression, illness and grief. What is it about these strong emotions that captivate your craft?
DAMILOLA ORIMOGUNJE
I choose these topics subconsciously, and I feel like it is an influence of my childhood. I saw a lot of things, so you tend to see death and betrayal in my films as themes. These themes were constant in my growing up and with death, it is not just the literal form of it; I’m also talking about the disappearance of people. I like to explore sadness without putting it in your face.
HILLARY ESSIEN
In your films, you convey emotions crisply. Do these films show the intensity with which you feel your characters’ pain?
DAMILOLA ORIMOGUNJE
I feel like I immerse myself in projects and I feel everything. I’m there with the actor, I want to feel what they’re feeling. Like method directing, I’m looking at the camera or the monitor, watching the actor and I can feel the emotions I want them to convey.
HILLARY ESSIEN
How do you decide what projects to work on?
DAMILOLA ORIMOGUNJE
I could have multiple ideas but will only work on the one that resonates with me. I like to centre the human experience in my films: poor healthcare, poor infrastructure, education and more. So when you see the film, you focus on the plot but it is the means to my end.
The plan is to make small films that can achieve critical acclaim and also make money. There’s the notion that art house films cannot resonate with the general Nigerian public, but I think it is a lie.
HILLARY ESSIEN
Inspiration for the film For Maria (Ebun Pataki) came after you read a Twitter thread, and in previous interviews, you have spoken about the research you carry out ahead of these projects. Are there any inclusions in your films that are from your life?
DAMILOLA ORIMOGUNJE
I put bits of my life into my films. In For Maria, there’s a scene where Afolabi (Gabriel Afolayan) is talking to Derin (Meg Otanwa) outside the bathroom door, he was telling her a story from his childhood. That is my story. My next film, Dear Ajayi, has many stories from my life.
[In our discussion, we bond over Persona, a 1966 Swedish psychological drama film, written and directed by Ingmar Bergman. A favourite for Orimogunje. He tells me he strives to make films like that.]
DAMILOLA ORIMOGUNJE
What I want to want to do with my art is similar to what Bergman did with storytelling in Persona. I love the way he’s able to tell societal stories—small stories, yes, but he builds on it. You can see pain, grief, and anguish in these stories and it’s very minimal. These characters are complicated. It is real because this is how humans are set. It’s beautiful.
HILLARY ESSIEN
In terms of film, what is the hardest thing for you to do?
DAMILOLA ORIMOGUNJE
I used to think of money, but now I would say the physical aspect of making the film. It is too many moving parts. I think it’s very difficult because…I like to think I’m a lazy person. I just want to chill.
HILLARY ESSIEN
What’s the hardest scene you’ve ever had to write?
DAMILOLA ORIMOGUNJE
It would have to be a scene in Dear Ajayi, a film that has taken me five years to write. It was supposed to my first feature film. I wrote the script after seeing Ida (2013) by Pawel Pawlikowski.
HILLARY ESSIEN
If you could make any of your films differently, which one would it be and how would you do it?
DAMILOLA ORIMOGUNJE
Losing My Religion. It’s a story I wish I made now that I’ve grown better as a filmmaker.
HILLARY ESSIEN
What would be different?
DAMILOLA ORIMOGUNJE
I would craft it to be more aesthetically pleasing, direct the acting better. I think my voice could also be clearer as regards the closing of the film. I’ve called it open-ended after I trying to explain it to an audience at AFRIFF in 2018. It lacked clarity but I realized everyone had a different meaning. Recently, I saw Everything, Everywhere At Once and I yelled ‘that’s what I was trying to tell at the closing of Losing My Religion’.
HILLARY ESSIEN
If you could break Dami’s process down into three words, what would they be?
DAMILOLA ORIMOGUNJE
I would say ‘think big, work hard, repeat’, though my mantra is that ‘nothing is impossible’, I think I can do anything.
HILLARY ESSIEN
We’ve spoken about the general ideas behind your upcoming projects but I’m curious about writing the script. What’s your process for that like?
DAMILOLA ORIMOGUNJE
Dear Ajayi is in the final phase of writing. I’ve been writing for five years; it is a film about three women, spanning three generations, trying to break free from societal expectations. The Clifford Orji project is still in the early writing phase. I’m very formulaic when I write my first draft, ensuring a three act structure is in place and other writing rules, but my next drafts are more inspirational by everything. Art or not, I consume till I go on set.
HILLARY ESSIEN
What’s next for you, Damilola Orimogunje? What exciting projects do you have in the pipeline?
DAMILOLA ORIMOGUNJE
My upcoming films explore societal issues like my previous works, one is more thrilling and horrific; it’s a four-part limited series on Clifford Orji. I’m writing and directing and I find this project fascinating because of the mystery behind the character and unpopular cannibalism culture in Africa. No one talks about it, no one thinks about it.
After Clifford’s arrest, he was asked if he would return to eating humans if released, he answered ‘Yes’, to me; that’s the story right there.
The other project is my second feature film after For Maria (Ebun Pataki). It’s called Dear Ajayi and it’s a film about two sisters with conflicting personalities who are faced with the hardship of finding success as they take care of their dying mother. This is a personal film and reflects most of my memories as a child. It’s like Roma to Alfonso Cuaron.
It’s going to be in black and white and I can’t wait to shoot this year. I also produced a film titled All the Colors of the World Are Between Black and White and it will be having its world premiere at Berlinale 2023.
HILLARY ESSIEN
Have you ever failed with a project? What did you learn from that? How did it change you and your process?
DAMILOLA ORIMOGUNJE
Yes, my first two attempts at film. Never finished production of the first, the second never got released. These experiences taught me to want more from myself and particularly hone every aspect of the project. Now, I plan every single little detail because of my earlier disappointment. I promised myself not to have a third failed project.
HILLARY ESSIEN
Can you tell me about them?
DAMILOLA ORIMOGUNJE
They are both short films—drama and experimental. I had planned to make the short drama in one long seamless take but the execution was terrible. The experimental film was shot on Chroma and the VFX is hilarious. I plan to go to my grave without any eyes seeing them.
HILLARY ESSIEN
What about music for your films? Do you have it mapped out at the beginning of your process or as it goes?
DAMILOLA ORIMOGUNJE
Sometimes I do plan it from the beginning. I listen to music to write so occasionally I find myself fixated on a song that inspires and works for a scene and it stays with me till I get to post.
I heard a song recently—Omo Tuntun by Sola Allyson, it was a favourite many years ago and I wished I had remembered it when I was thinking of music for the naming ceremony scene in For Maria.
HILLARY ESSIEN
[New Nollywood releases tend to portray the Nigerian experience from an often light hearted perspective, Damilola’s filmography leans away to explore the gritty side of life]
Do the places you’ve lived or visited have any influence on the storytelling process? What differences have you observed as you’ve gone through life?
DAMILOLA ORIMOGUNJE
I’ve lived all my life in Lagos and most of the time, my inspiration leading up to me making films about middle-class families is because I grew up middle-class. They are so underrepresented. A lot of people in Nigeria are low and middle-class, so why are you making rich people films? I understand that people want to fantasize and want to aspire to be, so it’s interesting to watch. For me, filmmaking is about them and there are so many stories we don’t tap into⎈
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