非洲少年亚伯拉罕·阿塔因戏一夜成名

    While most 14-year-olds are busy worrying about their adolescence, Abraham Attah has bigger fish to fry — he’s already carved a name out for himself in the international film scene.

    The teenager from the Ghanaian capital of Accra won the Marcello Mastroianni best young actor award at the 2015 Venice Film Festival last week for his lead role in Netflix’s first original feature movie, “Beasts of No Nation.”

    According to the film’s director Cary Fukunaga, Attah was working as a street vendor in Accra before being randomly chosen to take part in casting workshops for the blockbuster.

    “[He had] zero film experience, little education...but he became a somewhat professional actor, which was astounding to watch,” the Emmy award-winning director was quoted as saying to Business Insider in April.

    Attah plays Agu, a young boy whose world is torn apart when he is recruited as a child soldier in the civil war raging through an unnamed West African country.

    “We were playing football on our school field when a white man came and said, ‘We need some boys for a movie,’” Attah told a press conference in Venice. “We went to a TV station in Ghana for an audition and...I was cast.”

    Based on the 2005 novel by Nigerian author Uzodinma Iweala, the film has wowed critics at film festivals in Venice and Toronto and has already been tipped for an Oscar.

    “Beasts of No Nation” becomes available on Netflix and at selected cinemas on October 16.

    (SD-Agencies)