C. J. Obasi

EARLY LIFE

C. J. Obasi was born and raised in Owerri, the capital of Imo State in southeastern Nigeria. From a young age he was deeply influenced by Hammer Horror films, Stephen King novels and their film adaptations, classic cinema, superheroes and villains. As early as age three he began creating hand-drawn comic books based on these stories and sold them to his peers. He attended Government Secondary School, Owerri. He later studied Computer Science at the University of Nigeria, Nsukka (UNN). After graduating and working in a technical field (including as a web programmer), he left that path to pursue filmmaking full-time, describing the decision as essential to his calling.

In 2012 Obasi co-founded Fiery Film Company with the goal of creating genre-driven films from an African perspective. His directorial debut, the zero-budget zombie thriller Ojuju (2014), premiered at the Africa International Film Festival (AFRIFF), where it won Best Nigerian Film. It screened at numerous international festivals (including Fantasia, Pan African Film Festival, and others) and earned critical praise from outlets such as The Hollywood Reporter, IndieWire and Screen Anarchy. The film became a cult classic and was later optioned for series adaptation. It also earned him the Trailblazer of the Year award at the 2015 Africa Magic Viewers’ Choice Awards (AMVCA). His second feature, the crime thriller O-Town (2015), was inspired by Owerri and received further critical attention and award nominations. He directed the short Hello, Rain (2018), an adaptation of Nnedi Okorafor’s afrofuturist story “Hello, Moto.” It premiered at the International Short Film Festival Oberhausen and screened widely, winning a Special Mention at Fantasia and earning a nomination at the BFI London Film Festival. Obasi is a co-founder of the Surreal16 (S16) Collective with filmmakers Abba T. Makama and Michael Omonua. Inspired by Dogme 95, the collective issued a 16-point manifesto aimed at diversifying Nigerian cinema beyond mainstream comedies and wedding films. Their projects include the anthology Visions (2017) and the feature Juju Stories (2021), which world-premiered in competition at Locarno, won the Boccalino d’Oro for Best Film from Swiss independent critics, and later screened at BFI London, FESPACO and other festivals. His third feature, Mami Wata (2023), is a stylized black-and-white fantasy drama rooted in West African mermaid mythology. Developed through labs including Ouaga Film Lab, Less is More, EAVE and Durban FilmMart, it was shot in rural Benin Republic. It premiered in the World Cinema Dramatic Competition at the 2023 Sundance Film Festival, where it won the Special Jury Prize for Cinematography. It also won awards at FESPACO (including Best Image, Best Décor and the African Critics Prize), was Nigeria’s official submission for the Best International Feature Film at the 96th Academy Awards, and received nominations at the Independent Spirit Awards and NAACP Image Awards. It has been distributed theatrically and on streaming platforms across multiple territories. Obasi has also co-written projects including Lionheart (2018) and Living in Bondage: Breaking Free (2019). Upcoming work includes the psychological drama A Blue Butterfly (starring Steve Toussaint and Sanaa Lathan) and other projects such as La Pyramide. He is a voting member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and has served on festival juries (including Durban).

PERSONAL LIFE

Obasi is married to Oge Obasi, a television and film producer with experience on projects such as The Figurine, Desperate Housewives Africa and MTV Base Shuga. Together with the late screenwriter Benjamin Stockton, they founded Fiery Film Company in 2012. The couple have collaborated closely on his major films, with Oge serving as producer. They have spoken publicly about their partnership both professionally and as a family. In recent years they have spent time living and working in other African countries, including Benin Republic (during the making of Mami Wata) and later Rwanda.

C. J. Obasi is widely regarded as a leading figure in the new wave of Nigerian and African genre and art-house cinema. His work deliberately blends horror, fantasy, crime and mythology with distinctive visual style, drawing inspiration from filmmakers such as Akira Kurosawa and David Lynch while remaining rooted in African stories and aesthetics. Through Fiery Film and the Surreal16 Collective he continues to advocate for more diverse, ambitious filmmaking from the continent.