Okey Bakassi: It’s unfair to compare Nollywood to Hollywood

Okey Bakassi, an actor cum stand-up comedian, says it is unfair to compare Nigeria’s movie industry to its American counterpart.

Speaking on the sidelines of the premiere of Avengers: Endgame organised by the US consulate at Filmhouse Cinema, Oniru, he said Hollywood has had years of experience.

“Nollywood is doing an amazing job of telling African stories, specifically Nigerian stories. Nobody else can tell it better than us,” he told TheCable Lifestyle.

“So to draw a comparison won’t be fair on Nollywood. They (Hollywood) themselves had many years of cinematography, advancement in technology.  It’s not a fair comparison.

They (Hollywood) are telling their stories the way they want to tell their story. We are here telling our stories. These are two different things. But in technology, they are way ahead. So Nollywood is doing fantastically well, (there’s) a lot of room for improvement.”

‘Avengers: Endgame’ is the final sequel to Marvel’s 2012 movie, ‘The Avengers’

Commenting on the movie, he said: “You know when you’re seeing a movie like this which is the coming together of how many years of work, and you’re finally seeing like the ending, you know different layers of emotions will move in your head. So you probably need to sit down again and see it without expectations to get a clearer picture.

“For some people, I’m sure it would meet their expectations. There will always be critics who would always say it could have been like this or like that. But I think for me, they did an awesome job. I’ll still like to see it again to be very honest.”

The movie features Chris Evans, Robert Downey Jr., Chris Hemsworth, Chris Pratt, Mark Ruffalo, Scarlett Johansson and Danai Gurirain.