Djin awarded The Director's Eye at the African Film Festival of Cordoba

Kenyan filmmaker Hawa Essuman’s project Djin (The Wind of Destiny) has been awarded The Director’s Eye, a film fund provided by foundation Lettera 27 in collaboration with the ninth annual African Film Festival of Cordoba in Spain.

Essuman receives a €25,000 prize for the film’s development as part of the award, as well as support from industry leaders throughout the course of the project.

The script chronicles the clash between a coastal village’s traditional mythologies and modern times when a spirit selects people to fulfil their greatest dreams once every 30 years. It will be a Ghana-Kenya co-production.

A jury judged Djin the best of seven feature length narrative scripts focusing on Africa while participating in the fourth Forum for African Co-production.

In addition to the cash prize, The Director’s Eye award includes production advice, support searching for sponsors and initiating crowd funding and social networking campaigns. After the film’s completion, the film will be debuted internationally at a future edition of the festival.

Mira Tanna-Händel was awarded a special mention for her third feature length script Salme’s Freedom, about an impulsive child who runs away from home with a German trader.

Steven Markowitz, a South African producer and member of the jury, commended “the high quality of the participating projects, with which we corroborate a bright future for African cinema.”

Essuman has already earned an accolade this year for her script Logs of War from the International Film Festival of Durban, which was also selected to screen at the International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam.