Leila Djansi

Leila Djansi
'Leila Afua Djansi is an American and Ghanaian filmmaker who started her film career in the Ghana film industry.
Early life
Leila Djansi was born Leila Afua Djansi. Her father was a pilot and her mother a Senior Nursing Officer. Djansi grew up in India and Ghana. Although acting and writing were her hobbies, her career ambition was to become a gynecologist, a plan that later changed when she developed an interest in forensics. Ready to delve into the field of criminology, another career change occurred when she met the Ghanaian actor Sam Odoi, who convinced her to write a script for him. She was 19 years old when her script Babina was made into a movie by Producer Akwetey Kanyi.
Education
Djansi attended the Kabore Primary and JSS, Mawuli School for primary, junior and secondary education respectively all located in Ho, in the Volta Region of Ghana.
She began her film education at the National Film and Television School, but left Ghana for the United States to continue her Film and Television Degree at Savannah College of Art and Design on an artistic Honors Scholarship.
Career
President of the Ghana Library Board Readers club for three years, American-Ghanaian filmmaker Leila Djansi began her sojourn in the entertainment industry when she was a runner-up in a regional beauty pageant in 1998 while she was in junior high school.
Djansi began her filmmaking career in Ghana at the age of 19 with the Ghana Film Company. Djansi worked with the state-owned Gama Film Company, where she wrote and produced Legacy of love.
Working her way to the United States on an Artist Honors Scholarship to study film at the Savannah College of Art and Design, Leila began her film career whiles she was still studying at SCAD.
Her directorial debut I Sing of a Well in 2009 netted an unprecedented 11 nominations at the Africa Movie Academy Awards, winning the special Jury Award for Overall Best Film. In addition, the film was presented the BAFTA/LA Choice Award at the Pan African film festival for excellence in filmmaking.
Djansi followed with the advocacy film Sinking Sands which supports to the say no to Violence Against Women campaign for UNiFEM Ghana.
In 2011, Djansi's Ties That Bind won Best Diaspora Film at the San Diego Black Film Festival, it also became an Official Selection to AFI's New African Films Festival in 2012. The films star Kimberly Elise (John Q, Confirmation) was nominated for Best Actress at the American Black Film Festival. The film was also nominated for Outstanding Foreign Film at the 2012 Black Reel Awards.
Djansi's LIKE COTTON TWINES was an official selection to the 2016 Los Angeles film Festival under the World Fiction Section. The film shot entirely on location in Ghana explores issues of modern-day slavery when an African American volunteer travels to a rural community in Ghana to teach and discovers one of his students, a 14-year-old girl has to become a religious slave.
Her other credits include Where Children Play with Grammy Winner Macy Gray, the UNiFEM advocacy film Sinking Sands, the LA Film Festival Best Episodic Television Show 40 and Single for AMC's Urban Movie Channel and All The Men in my Life starring Rochelle Aytes.
Leila Djansi has been recognized by various international organizations for continuously using her art to bring light to women's issues, and she has consistently made movies for women and about women, whiles employing diversity behind and in front of the camera.
Awards and recognition
Djansi's first film was awarded a 2009 worldFest Platinum Award; the film, Grass Between My Lips, is a story of female circumcision and early marriage, set in a northern Ghana village.In 2010, her debut feature, I Sing of a Well was nominated for 11 Africa Movie Academy Awards. The film won 3 awards: Best Sound, Best Costume and the Jury Special Award for Over-All Best Film.
In 2011, Djansi was presented with the BAFTA/LA Pan African Film Festival Choice Award for the film I Sing of a Well.
Djansi's 2011 film Sinking Sands received 10 Africa Movie Academy Award nominations, with Ama K Abebrese winning the Best Actress Award and Djansi earning the Best Original Screenplay Award. At the first Ghana Movie Awards in 2011, Djansi's Sinking Sands received awards for "Best Art Direction", "Best Costume", "Best West African Film" and "Best Picture". Sinking Sands was nominated in 14 categories.
Djansi's third directorial effort Ties That Bind received a Black Reel Awards Nomination in 2012. The film also won the Best Diaspora film at the 2012 San Diego Black Film Festival.
In 2016, Djansi directed Like Cotton Twines, an exploration of the practice of Trokosi in her native Ghana. The film was nominated for "Best World Fiction Film" at the Los Angeles Film Festival.
Djansi's work and contribution to the Ghana film industry has been recognized by UNiFEM Ghana, The African Women Development Fund, The Ghana Musicians Association and other social issue minded communities.
References
External links
Turning Point Pictures
Keisha Hatchett, "Interview: Like Cotton Twines Filmmaker Leila Djansi on Slavery, Black Unity and Diversity in Hollywood", The Mary Sue, 20 January 2017.
Stephen Saito, "LA Film Fest '16 Interview: Leila Djansi on Untangling 'Like Cotton Twines, The Moveable Fest, 15 June 2016.
1981 births
Living people
Ghanaian film directors
Ghanaian women film directors
Ghanaian film producers
Ghanaian women film producers
Ghanaian screenwriters
Ghanaian women screenwriters
Mawuli School alumni