Title: Crocodile
Foreign Title:
Year: 2026
Country: Nigeria / New Zealand
Language: In English, Pidgin English, Hausa, and Yoruba with English subtitles
Director: The Critics, Pietra Brettkelly
Click here to see the cast and crew
At the outset, The Critics are identified as a Nigerian “collective” of (mainly) seven teenage boys with filmmaking skills that have earned them a viral following since 2012 when they began making mobile phone-shot sci-fi shorts, comedies, spoofs even, garnering amazing stats on YouTube. (100 subscribers was a struggle, 1000 subscribers was a struggle, now we are at 100K and possibly more subscribers) The Critics’ core members, Raymond, Ronald, and Richard are from the Yusuff family, while Godwin and Victor Josiah are cousins and Ridwan Adeniyi and another associate complete the close knit “family” who have come a long way from their teenage years. This documentary follows their 13-year rise to international recognition, a stardom by any standard. (The mailman with the YT plaque announcing their 100K milestone is greeted with a big laugh of surprise by the boys.)
Of motivation, three speak from the heart: Instead of just being angry, we make films to fill the void. I lost my mum two years ago so filmmaking is a form of escape from being sad and being alone. My dad is a pastor, he said filmmaking is bad, he was angry, he slapped me.
Fast-forward to August 2020 when a big wooden box arrives from Hollywood – state of the art production gear. All seven are anxious, seated around a smart phone: J.J. Abrams, of Star Trek and Mission Impossible fame, is on the live cam. Following some niceties, he says, “The truth is – you are all magicians!” (it gets a roar from the group). Low-fi success (with SFX) is thus rewarded.
True to being “critics”, the boys don’t mind talking politics. Is being African a direct obligation to making African themed films? (pause) Do I have to show the African-ness in my film? (ay, there’s the rub) In the year 2040 half of the Nigerian languages will be extinct and Gbagy is one of them. We watch as they move out of their homes, “leaving the land of no return to the land of milk and honey. This will literally change everything from the way we make our films to the way we shoot. Because there will be a 100% freedom to do stuff we want to do.”
In the new space, power outage no. 2 will not stop them. (Their families will try) We are given to see more and more of their own creations and it’s interesting to be bounced between fiction and fact, but the facts become difficult to handle and there is not much of a seam between the two. A white bedsheet is clipped to two lighting stands for the local screenings in the villages. The audience members’ faces are a sight to behold. We tend to forget the audience who’s watching the film. They are subjects, too.
There must be interpersonal friction in this collective, but it comes totally unexpectedly. There were the golden years and now there is the beauty of the films alongside the inevitable rupture caused by transgressions, pain, and resentment. And shame. It’s not an easy watch.
Then there is the collaboration of the country, its people and its rapid daily routine, glimpsed in passing through the rear passenger-side window.
The title Crocodile comes from Kaduna, Nigeria, whose local nickname is “Crocodile City.” The film’s name is an homage to the place where The Critics – they are now The Critics Company – began a journey that would ultimately transform their unusual name into a symbol for a “New Wave” of DIY filmmaking collectives emerging from Africa.
