TIPTOPSTARS

Exposure to movies dine in Cameroon, by Cameroonians has been a major challenge. Can Cameroonians watch our movies? Can Cameroonians procure copies of Cameroonian moies? Can they watch them with appetite? Can they ask for our movies? Can they make positive comments on movies done here? These questions have hovered in the air for quite some time. The answers seem to have start coming. A simple test was conducted by Tiptopstars recently on French-speaking students of the Higher Teachers Training College, ENS, Yaounde indicated that Cameroonians can love our movies, if they get exposed to them.  Close to a thousand student of the "Formation Bilingue" (the composite bilingual programme for university students) were seen, each holding a copy of Fred Fondo's Another Chance. They had opted to use the movie as a medium in learning English and so were tested on it by Yimbu Emmanuel, their lecturer, himself actor and protagonist in Another Chance. Yimbu had however initiated the brilliant idea of taking Collywood movies to the classroom, a move observers have attested would go a long way to market our films. After watching the film, protected in ENS's biggest amphitheatre (full to the brim), the students were required to answer questions based on what they had watched. Many of them could easily forget they were being tested as they rather savoured the beautiful story and performance of the actors including their "Prof", as they referred to Yimbu. "I'm quite impressed with what I've just watched," Effa Messele Jean Rodrigue, a student told me. He went on: "The images are good, the acting wonderful, locations great, the language, superb!" To Endangte Ghislain, Another Chance was not only a good language learning aid, but a true reflection of ongoing efforts to improve on the quantity and quality of Cameroonian movies. "I must laud our lecturer, Mr Yimbu Emmanuel for such a brilliant idea," the student said.

To Yimbu, projection of Collywood movies on campus has come to stay. "We'll make it a regular item on our learning programme," he confirmed. The students left the hall copy-in-hand, visibly satisfied.