Rixel Studios is aiming for a massive, 50,000-person turnout at Lagos’ Tafawa Balewa Square on September 26, 2026. Their goal isn’t a standard movie premiere for their upcoming feature, Black Market, but is an official, high-stakes attempt to rewrite the Guinness World Records. They aim to surpass the current movie screening attendance number, dethroning the current global record, which stands at 43,000 attendees.
The massive undertaking is being executed through a heavyweight industry coalition, with Rixel Studios partnering alongside FilmOne Studios, Signet Ring Studios, and Switch Visuals Production.
This project marks an incredibly fast take off into high-volume distribution for the young studio, arriving right on the heels of their 2025 debut feature, Red Circle. For this outing, screenwriting duties fell to Abdul Tijani-Ahmed and Fatimah Gimsay, with Gimsay also taking the director’s chair for the shoot on location in Abeokuta, Ogun State. Managing the heavy logistics is Rixel Studios’ Nora Awolowo, who notes that the size of the event is a deliberate move to challenge traditional African cinema distribution patterns.
“We are excited to go on this journey as a team and we have taken a lot of lessons from our previous film,” Awolowo noted, highlighting a core corporate goal of pushing creative and operational boundaries.
FilmOne Studios’ Chief Content Officer, Ladun Awobokun, concurred to Awolowo’s speech, stating that he views the upcoming record attempt as a high-stakes cultural statement for the local industry. According to Awobokun, the massive gathering is less about traditional cinema exhibition and more about creating a historical milestone that projects Nollywood’s operational scale to the global market.
To successfully gain numbers of viewers of that magnitude, the production relies on a highly bankable ensemble cast. The film features names Lateef Adedimeji and Linda Ejiofor-Suleiman in the lead roles, backed by a deep lineup including Itele D Icon, Scarlet Gomez, Omowunmi Dada, Teniola Aladese, Susan Pwajok, Uzor Arukwe, Folagade Banks, Tomiwa Tegbe, Andrew Bunting, Shamz Garuba, and Adeoluwa Akintoba.
