海角大神

When Godwin Jabangwe stood in front of a room full of Hollywood movie executives to pitch his first feature film last November, he knew his idea wasn鈥檛 exactly the stuff of a conventional blockbuster.

He wanted to make an animated movie called 鈥淭unga,鈥� he explained, about a young girl who travels to a mythical lost city on a quest to save her village from drought. It would be set in Zimbabwe. Oh right, and it would be a musical.

鈥淔ive years ago, with an idea like that, you would have been laughed out of the room,鈥� Mr. Jabangwe says. But his idea immediately caught the ear of a big production company, and last month, after a scrappy bidding war, Jabangwe signed a deal with them. 鈥淭unga鈥� is going to be a Netflix original.

In recent years, as Netflix has made a global play for subscribers, it has courted them with local stories 鈥� from Korean police dramas to Mexican political thrillers to Japanese sci fi. But until recently, African viewers were largely left out of that equation. Log into Netflix in Johannesburg, Nairobi, or Lagos, and almost any movie or show you could watch took place somewhere else.

That is changing, if slowly. Since May of last year, Netflix has commissioned original shows and films from Nigeria, South Africa, and Zimbabwe. Last week, the service debuted the Sundance darling 鈥淭he Boy Who Harnessed the Wind,鈥� a film by the Nigerian-British director Chiwetel Ejiofor set in rural Malawi and acted mostly in a local language, Chichewa.聽

The growing interest in Africa reflects a growing market, as more people go online and earn enough disposable income to subscribe. And a handful of African productions is a relatively low-stakes investment for Netflix, which rolled out about 700 original movies and shows last year alone.

But in courting African filmmakers, it鈥檚 also helping to shake up tired notions of whose stories are worth paying attention to.

鈥淭here鈥檚 no reason why an African film can鈥檛 be global in the same way an American or European one can,鈥� says Samson Kambalu, the Malawian-British artist who translated the script for 鈥淭he Boy Who Harnessed the Wind鈥� into Chichewa and appears in the film. 鈥淭here鈥檚 no reason why African films can鈥檛 open themselves up to the world like that.鈥�

But they have often lacked the platforms to do it.聽

Take Nollywood, the Nigerian film industry, which churns out more movies every year than any other country except India. But despite its frenetic levels of production and millions of devoted fans, few Nigerian films have become hits outside the country鈥檚 borders.聽

In part, that鈥檚 by design. Nollywood鈥檚 core appeal is that it tells Nigerians stories they don鈥檛 often find in film elsewhere: their own. But as piracy has gobbled into Nollywood鈥檚 profits in recent years, that local focus has turned against it, says Nigerian film critic Wilfred Okiche.

鈥淔or a while now, producers have been struggling with how to crack distribution,鈥� he says. 鈥淗ow do you get these films to the widest possible audience, while still getting paid?鈥�

Netflix wasn鈥檛 the first company to try and take Nollywood online. In 2011, a Nigerian entrepreneur launched a streaming service called iROKO TV, and more recently, South African TV giant聽MultiChoice added a streaming option to its cable offerings, which include a series of channels with mostly Nigerian content called Africa Magic.

Netflix itself dipped into Nollywood slowly, buying its first global streaming rights for two Nigerian films in 2015, and opening a server in Lagos the following year to allow faster streaming for Nigerian users.

But it wasn鈥檛 until this January that Netflix released its first Nigerian original film, 鈥淟ionheart,鈥� a drama about a Nigerian woman struggling to keep her family business alive after her father has a heart attack.

鈥淚 believe authenticity has a home in today鈥檚 globalized world,鈥� the film鈥檚 director and lead actress, the megawatt Nollywood star Genevieve Nnaji, told Essence Magazine in January. 鈥淎 good human story with relatability from anywhere will travel far and resonate with viewers despite their backgrounds.鈥�

In some cases, that鈥檚 about setting familiar storylines against new backdrops, as Netflix is doing with its first two African original series: a South African spy thriller called 鈥淨ueen Sono鈥� and a South African high-school drama called 鈥淏lood & Water.鈥�

In others, it鈥檚 about taking viewers so deeply into an unfamiliar place that they feel at home there, says Mr. Kambalu, of 鈥淭he Boy Who Harnessed the Wind,鈥� which dramatizes the true story of a 13-year-old Malawian boy and his attempts to construct a homemade windmill to save his village from drought.

鈥淚 realized with this movie that you don鈥檛 have to rely on all these tropes to make people care. You can just present reality. You can just let characters indulge deeply in their own personalities. That鈥檚 enough,鈥� he says.

Of course, globally known cast members like Ms. Nnaji or Mr. Ejiofor (famous for, among other things, his starring role in 鈥�12 Years a Slave鈥�) don鈥檛 hurt. Still, says Jabangwe, the creator of of 鈥淭unga,鈥� Netflix鈥檚 omnivorous interest in finding new shows made it more eager than its competitors to hear from a wider range of voices.

鈥淲hat Netflix has done is crack open a door for stories that probably have never been told by the big studios,鈥� says Jabangwe 鈥� like the mythological, musical adventure of a little Zimbabwean girl and her companion, a honey badger.

For many of his viewers, he knows, 鈥淭unga鈥� will take them into a new and unfamiliar place.

But for Jabangwe, after more than a decade in the United States, it will take him somewhere else.

Home.