Nigeria’s first Web3 movie project, “Small Town Burnouts” is set to be produced by Romi studios. The project is currently being crowdfunded on Web3 through NFTs.
Small Town Burnouts is a movie that examines the lives and career-defining moments of two up-and-coming artistes, Karah and SoulBlacksheep based in Ibadan, Nigeria.
The movie explores the story of how pursuing a creative career in an African country could affect one’s socio-cultural views and personal psychology. The film is a social experiment as both top cast who make up the band in the film are themselves real life music artists. Hence, the film is a documentation of real-time corporeal experiences defined by a scripted story line.
According to their Website,” Small Town Burnouts is a film project poised to be one of the first ever feature length film to be fully funded by Web3. It tells the tale of a music bond of two musicians trying to find themselves through their art as they seek to navigate and thrive in the Nigerian music industry as it is.”
Romi Studios, the studio behind the production of Small Town Burnouts has tapped Barnabas Emordi, the highest grossing Director of Photography in Nollywood (2021) to join in on the project. Barnabas Emordi brings in experience to the film’s direction as he already has a résumé filled with some of Nigeria’s biggest cinema blockbusters including “Prophetess”, “DOD” (Nollywood’s first time-travel film) and multi award-winning film, “Elevator Baby”.
The movie’s executive producer and director who is also the founder of Romi studios, is pursuing a different approach to the movie as it is being crowdfunded using NFTs on Web3 platforms, making it the first NFT funded movie in Nigeria.
The crowdfund will have holders receive an NFT, which entitles them to a variety of special benefits, such as access to the visual audio gallery so they can listen to the album before it is released, a special premiere of the movie, a Small Town Burnouts merch box, and an invitation to the Small Town Burnouts live in concerts in Lagos and Ibadan, either physically or virtual depending on the event.
The movie is scheduled for release in December 2023, with Lagos and Ibadan serving as the locations for the premiere.
