Abraham Attah played a gripping role as a increasingly desensitised child soldier in this year’s critically acclaimed ‘Beasts of No Nation’, and from that first award at the Venice Film Festival, the recognition keeps coming in.

Since winning the Marcello Mastroianni’s Best Young Actor award at the 2015 Venice Film Festival, the awards and nominations have been flowing in for the young actor.

There’s a new one to add to his budding résumé, as the US association the Black Film Critics Circle have bestowed upon him the ‘rising star’ award, as they honoured the best in cinema for the year.

The organisation described Attah’s performance in the Civil War epic as “one of the strongest and most phenomenal we have ever seen”, adding that the young actor has “a very bright future ahead of him”.

Attah starred alongside Idris Elba in the movie, which was shot on location in Ghana, and was based on Nigerian author Uzodinma Iweala’s 2005 novel of the same name.

‘Rocky’ spin-off ‘Creed’, starring Michael B Jordan, Tessa Thompson, and Sylvester Stallone- was adjudged the best film of 2015, whilst best ensemble performance and best original screenplay both went to the NWA biopic, ‘Straight Outta Compton’.