A Ghanaian documentary is among the African projects in line for a new critics prize at Switzerland’s Locarno Open Doors programme, which runs from August 5 to 10.
African Film Press (AFP), a continental alliance of the publications Akoroko, Sinema Focus, and What Kept Me Up, has joined Open Doors as an award partner and will present the AFP Critics Prize to one of the selected projects.
Among those projects is “Too Much Music,” directed and produced by Ghana’s Aseye Fiagbe. The documentary profiles the late Ghanaian keyboard prodigy Kiki Gyan, putting a homegrown story before an international industry audience.
The prize carries a 500 dollar cash award, a certificate, and continued editorial coverage of the winner across AFP’s networks. A jury will name the recipients on August 10. AFP co-founder Tambay Obenson has described the award as a way of “centering African critical voices in festival culture.”
AFP first handed out the prize in December 2025 at the fifth Surreal16 Film Festival in Lagos, where Nigerian filmmaker Dika Ofoma won for his short film “Obi Is a Boy.” Ofoma had earlier carried his feature project through Open Doors and collected three awards there.
The 2026 edition marks the second year of a four year Open Doors cycle dedicated to 42 African countries, with eligibility shaped by guidelines from the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation. The programme pairs training, mentoring, and networking with public screenings at the Locarno Film Festival and its industry arm.
AFP is one of two partners added this year, alongside a 4,000 euro scholarship from the training network EAVE and the Luxembourg Film Fund. Established prizes return, led by the 50,000 Swiss franc Open Doors Grant, the 8,000 euro CNC Development Prize, and the 6,000 euro Arte Kino International Prize.
