NAWI – Trailer
Starring
Michelle Lemuya Ikeny
Joel Liwan
Ochungo Benson
Ben Tekee
Michelle Chebet Tiren
Patrick Oketch
with Marianne Nungo Akinyi
and Nyokabi Macharia
DIRECTOrs
Kevin & Toby Schmutzler
Mourine Apuu
Vallentine Chelluget
STORY
Milcah Cherotich Mihcael
Producers
Lydia Wrensch
Caroline Muhl
Brizan Were
Exec. Producers
Ludwig Bayern
Steven Haft
Katja Eichinger
Matthias Rosenberger
CINEMATOGRAPHY
Klaus Kneist
Renata Mwende
art director
Erixon Kangethe
partners
Learning Lions
Baobab Pictures
Loropio Girls Highschool
NAWI is a story about an ambitious young girl whose father sells her off to a stranger for a herd of goats. It is an educational feature film project that was shot in Turkana (a County in Northern Kenya) in 2023. Together with the NGO Learning Lions, we try to give an insight into the issue of illegal child marriage which is still very common in the rural regions of Turkana.
NAWI won an Africa Academy Award and was selected as the Kenyan submission for the Oscars 2025! It was named Best Film at PAFF in Los Angeles and Stockholm International Film Festival Junior, secured a Special Jury Award at Beijing International Film Festival, and won Audience Awards at multiple festivals.
According to UNICEF 640.000.000 girls and women alive have been married underage. Together with Learning Lions we are collecting donations to combat child marriage by funding girl schools.
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Off the record: Learning Lions hosted a writing competition in the forefield to find both a story and a topic that is crucial for the region as well as originally African. The winner of this competition – Milcah, who submitted a compelling story about forced marriage – visited us in Germany, and then our team visited her and the Learning Lions program in Turkana to host a Kenyan-German writers' room in the desert.