Movie Review:

Alakada Reloaded…

Just before you spend your hard or soft earned –depending on who is paying- money to see a Nollywood movie in the cinema, let me give you my two cents and after that, you can decide if it is still a wise decision seeing the movie or not. Today, let us talk about Alakada Reloaded:

Bae or Boo –doesn’t really matter which one of them now- had been talking a lot about how he could not wait to see the movie Alakada Reloaded, he said he had watched the thriller and the movie was filled with so many famous funny Nigerian actors, so he was sure he would have a blast seeing it. I was really busy at the time, then he was cranky at some point; he threatened to see the movie without me, so I stopped every other thing I was doing to go see the movie with him. And last week Friday, we finally saw it.

When we got to D’Palms in Victoria Island, we had to wait an hour, thirty minutes for the movie, but we were not bothered because, Bae was sure the movie was going to be worth our while. We kept ourselves busy with some Cold Stone ice cream and a medium sized Debonair’s Chicken Tikka pizza. One hour, thirty minutes later and we were in the cinema hall.

Ten minutes into the movie, he looked at me funny and said,

“Did we just pay money to see a Yoruba movie in the cinema?”

I laughed and said, “it just might be so my dear.”

Now, this is one stunt Toyin Abraham pulled that I must commend her for: All the previews of the movie I saw made me believe it was an English speaking movie. I am not Yoruba, neither is my Yoruba speaking and understanding game anything to write home about; so watching a Yoruba movie and having to read the interpretation below the screen is a stress I can only permit myself to go through when I am realllyyyyyy bored and a Friday evening wasn’t the right time for such, neither did I imagine I would have to pay for it –no pun intended-. But that was the boat we found ourselves in, I guess we had no choice than to sail through.

The movie:

To me, it is a combination of different short funny YouTube videos as one movie. It had no plot whatsoever, it was completely disjointed. A lot of scenes were totally irrelevant. There were characters that featured in the movie that made me ask myself, what was this person’s relevance to the move; like Ebiye the comedian, his second scene was totally confusing and irrelevant. Or the Lady who came in and was mistaken for a prophetess? And then Helen Paul’s role? Why Toyin Abraham fainted when she saw Helen Paul?

Each scene was a rollercoaster of thoughts and imagination for me, I kept on waiting and expecting further build ups of characters and scenes that never happened.

In all, two things were clear to me about the movie: The strong intent to make the viewers laugh which was overly played out, it became too much; because some funny scenes took too much time it lost its relevance. And the lack of proper connection between the story writer, the script writer and the director.

Three weeks ago, at Bemyoda’s album launch, I learnt a great lesson from an actor I met, Seun Ajayi. He took over twenty minutes explaining how his heart leaps when he reads a well written story, that from just reading the script he knows if he would happily act a movie or not. This got me thinking, that as story writers, script writers, directors etc, when we do our jobs, we need to take our minds away from ourselves, to that of our audience. We need to make sure that we make their hearts leap whenever they read or see our works; after all they are the ones we are doing it for. It is not enough to just make money out of it, it is more about gaining the trust and loyalty of your audience or customers.

Now the characters:

Toyin Abraham does an amazing job with acting. She is a beautiful actress who is not afraid to wear an ugly character and make the best out of it. She interpreted her role very well. She certainly dotted her i’s and crosses her t’s.

This is the second movie I have watched that featured Gabriel Afolayan (first was Okafor’s Law) and he is slowly winning my heart. I do not know where he has been hiding, but I am really impressed with his acting and I want to see more of him.

Lilian Esoro was the coolest street girl I have ever seen.

Nedu of Wazobia FM was everything you know him for: witty, interesting and funny. I loved his character.

In summary, I would score the movie a 6 out of 10, because, howbeit plotless, I still had a good laugh. And one message I hope I have been able to drive is that things are changing and more people are now willing to watch Nollywood movies in the cinemas; please do not waste this steam so it doesn’t wear out, we need to give people value for their money.

Okay guys, I hope this was helpful in your decision on whether to see this movie or not.

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……….Talk2urHommie……….