FILMMAKER Judith Niyonizera has announced that she has a new film project dubbed ‘Gift of Kindness’ which is just days away from release as her second movie project she is going to release in her filmmaking career. The actress, who lives in Canada, is in Kigali where she is looking forward to premiering the movie in her native country ‘anytime soon.’ The movie, she said, is in its final touches as the actress is exploring channels and strategies of distribution as soon as the movie starts to premier. “Actually the film is almost done and releasing it is just a matter of time. My team and I have been working on the project since July last year and I can’t wait to present it to the local film enthusiasts,” Niyonizera said of the movie. Although she could not share enough details concerning the story behind the film, Niyonizera said the film is inspired by moments that happen in life while it also preaches kindness another. It’s a film that features the female filmmaker herself alongside actors/actresses from different African countries, including Ghana and Nigeria among others. Niyonizera has recently, on different occasions, been sharing pictures on her social media, hanging out with another man who is believed to have replaced ex-husband Safi Madiba after the former Urban Boys announced that they had parted ways. Niyonizera confirmed that she has got new love in the Canadian man she avoided to share his identity in the media. “He’s my new love. We’ve not been together for long but, for privacy reasons, I won’t say much about our relationship,” she said. Asked whether her new movie is connected to a story of her relationship with the man, she quickly dismissed the claim. “It’s not a true story, but the whole story of the film reflects things that happen in our everyday life,” she said. Niyonizera has been investing in filmmaking for over the past two years where she has been both acting in different films while also directing her own movie with ‘Gift of Kindness’ becoming her second project after ‘Ni Za Nduru’, a movie series exploring the lives of celebrities ‘behind the scenes’. While it was shown twice a week on TV 10, the movie never lasted long on the screens despite the fact that movie enthusiasts were excited to discover the life of celebrities in their normal life. It was aired for few weeks before the distribution team led by Niyonizera decided to suspend the distribution for unknown reasons. The actress admits that the film was a flop because it never matched people’s expectations blaming a bad distribution approach as the reason behind. However, she insists people will still have a chance to watch the movie since she has got a new team helping her on fresh distribution of the movie. “We did the film during the lockdown and its distribution was not really convincing. I think the timing for the release was not perfect. But after seeking advice from Canadian people who are pioneers in content distribution, they agreed to help me distribute the movie and I hope people will know where to get the film very soon,” she explained.
