Abubakar Bashir Abdulkareem, popularly known as Mai Shadda, is the producer of the much-talked-about Hausa movie titled ‘Mariya.’ With the movie set for release this weekend, he talks about the project.
Weekend Magazine: Why do you consider ‘Mariya’ a unique movie?
Abubakar Mai Shadda: If I must say, the film has a lot of positive lessons to take home, especially as it relates to early marriage for the girl-child, which is still in practice in our society.
In our communities, you would observe that girls of 13, 15 or even less are being given out in maybe. This is in contrast with may be sending her to school to seek education at that tender age. Also, most of the time when marriage is being arranged, instead of her parents considering somebody within her age bracket, she is given out to an elderly person old enough to be her father or grandfather as the case may be. So this is basically the issue the movie tried to address.
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| Mai Shadda |
WM: Could you tell us a little about the story of the movie?
Mai Shadda: It is a story of an innocent girl and how she was given out in marriage to Karkuzu, a chief butcher in the village who is old enough to be her grandfather.
The old man Karkuzu fancies young girls so much that any young beautiful girl he sees, he wants to marry. And once she gets pregnant, he divorces her. It was in his lust for young beautiful girls that he approached Mariya and sought her hand in marriage.
‘Mariya’ could be seen as a deviation from traditional Kannywood storylines of recent times. It is a movie that aims to relate with social realities of daily life.
The story is woven around issues surrounding early child marriage for girls, a practice that is common in Hausa setting.
WM: Can you name a few actors featured in the film?
Mai Shadda: We have Ali Nuhu, Umar M. Sherrif, Abbah Al-Mustapha, Hamisu Iyantama, Alhassan Kwalle, Musa Maisana’a, Maryam Yahaya and many others. The story was written by Fauziya D. Suleiman.
WM: Where was the film shot?
Mai Shadda: It was shot on different locations both in the village and city. We shot some scenes in Laraba Abasawa, while we shot some scenes at various locations within Kano metropolis.
WM: What about the budget, how much would you say the film has consumed?
Mai Shadda: All I can say for now is that, the film is very expensive. It has gulped a huge sum of money.
WM: Could you tell us why unlike other movies this movie lacks publicity?
Mai Shadda: We are trying to be innovative in our approaches promoting films. Initially, we promoted our films by placing trailers in other movies but now we want to explore opportunities in utilising social media to promote the films.
I tried that with my movie called ‘Kalan Dangi’, and it worked well. That is why we chose not to promote this as an adjunct to another film. We are only promoting through social media and Arewa 24.
WM: How different is ‘Mariya’ from your other films?
Mai Shadda: The film is very different because of the time taken to produce it, and the dedication of the cast, and the crew, which also made working on the project a great experience.
WM: Why the choice of Sallah festivity period for the release of ‘Mariya’?
Mai Shadda: We chose the period because we want the message in the film to reach as many people as possible.
