Living in Bondage - Breaking Free (My review)
So I saw Living in bondage - breaking free on Sunday for the first time. This is the sequel of the popular 1992 Living in Bondage that had Andy Okeke and his beautiful wife, Merit. By 12 midnight of Monday, I had seen the movie for the third time in 24 hours and each time felt new for me.
I grew up loving Nollywood, I enjoyed our movies better than foreign movies and maybe because I could relate better to our movies than the foreign ones. By secondary school, my sisters and I had a big book where we wrote down names of movies we had seen. We took turns to rent movies from the video club using money from our allowance to do this but it was worth it.
However along the line, I got bored of Nollywood movies, they became repetitive, boring and redundant for me, I could not be bothered to see it, let alone use my money to rent or buy. Then came the cinema era which we are now in. The first Nollywood movie I ever saw in the cinema was '76 and I was blown away. I loved the story and the attention to details, imagine how excited I was when I saw a vintage gas stove that looked like my mother's in the 90s, oh and oxford cabin biscuit. From that day, I swore to see more Nollywood movies in the cinema and I have kept to that promise. Also, Nollywood is one of my favorite things about Nigeria, an industry I will like to be part of someday and so if I must criticize, I must pay film makers for giving me something to talk about.
Talking of Living in bondage, I was skeptical about a new face being the lead actor of the sequel of one of Nollywood's oldest movie, "I hope he is not another instagram actor that they want to slap on our screen till our eyes bleed" I thought but Swanky Jka (Nnamdi Okeke) is one of the most brilliant actors in recent times! That young man nailed his role perfectly and conveyed his emotions well! You could tell when he was desperate, when he was nervous, when he was happy, when he was tensed, when he was scared, when he was in love etc! And every scene with him looked effortless! The chemistry between him and his love interest, Munachi Abii (Kelly) and his brother, Shawn Faqua (Tobe) was so real, their bond was believable.
Talking of old Nollywood actors, Kanayo.O.Kanayo (Chief Omego), Kenneth Okonkwo (Andy Okeke), Bob Manuel (Chief Mike), Zulu Adigwe (Nnamdi's foster dad), Ebere Okaro (Nnamdi's foster mom) and of course Ramsey Nouah (Richard Williams)! These people brought their A game as they have been doing for over two decades in the industry. Ramsey Nouah acted as the villain in the movie and he made occult look so good, he effortlessly switched from a billionaire business tycoon to an occult leader while commanding great charisma in both roles. I love that the 'demon' was good looking and not the typical ugly looking demon/villain. The occult scenes in the movie showed that yes, this is new Nollywood and we don't portray these evil scenes with all the scary sounds and images you grew up to know. The world has changed and so have we.
The use of bloggers instead of the police showed me that they were in tune with current trend. The same way we have bloggers who bring these sort of news to us, the movie played on that and I think they were spot on. They wanted us to know Nnamdi was desperate and we could literally see this from his very first scene where he tried to get into the VIP section of the club and leaving his job while trying to corner the clients of his former employers. You may miss it but I don't think it was coincidence that three people (his former colleague, his friend and his foster dad) told him "you too dey do pass yourself". You could literally see the twinkle in his eyes whenever he was close to anything that looked like wealth and although, the switch from poverty to wealth was sudden but it was perfectly done. He did not see random money on the road and became wealthy, nobody was in his cupboard vomiting money for him and all of that old Nollywood. He won a pitch and got paid for it and got to meet even richer people, signing deals like normal people do in real life.
The movie ended without us knowing who Richard Williams is and where he came from but I believe that is because there might be plans for another movie. Uzoma and even Nnamdi will definitely not go scot free. What I loved about the movie the most was the cinematography! It is a beautiful movie, the QUALITY is top notch! I loved the story and the casting was perfect! I left the cinema, ready to make cute ritualist babies with Nnamdi Okeke! I also don’t think the story has ended, I believe this is a foundation for more to come, I loved the acting, the blogger's character might have been exaggerated but for the most, I loved the acting! Again, Kudos to Swanky Jka! I loved the dialogue, I loved the songs and boy, the wealth! Save for Obinna jumping from his 18TH FLOOR PENTHOUSE, the movie was very realistic! I will watch again and I hope we see more movies like this and even better!
Swanky got a new fan in me and I’m definitely going to see whatever that guy acts going forward!
I grew up loving Nollywood, I enjoyed our movies better than foreign movies and maybe because I could relate better to our movies than the foreign ones. By secondary school, my sisters and I had a big book where we wrote down names of movies we had seen. We took turns to rent movies from the video club using money from our allowance to do this but it was worth it.
However along the line, I got bored of Nollywood movies, they became repetitive, boring and redundant for me, I could not be bothered to see it, let alone use my money to rent or buy. Then came the cinema era which we are now in. The first Nollywood movie I ever saw in the cinema was '76 and I was blown away. I loved the story and the attention to details, imagine how excited I was when I saw a vintage gas stove that looked like my mother's in the 90s, oh and oxford cabin biscuit. From that day, I swore to see more Nollywood movies in the cinema and I have kept to that promise. Also, Nollywood is one of my favorite things about Nigeria, an industry I will like to be part of someday and so if I must criticize, I must pay film makers for giving me something to talk about.
Talking of Living in bondage, I was skeptical about a new face being the lead actor of the sequel of one of Nollywood's oldest movie, "I hope he is not another instagram actor that they want to slap on our screen till our eyes bleed" I thought but Swanky Jka (Nnamdi Okeke) is one of the most brilliant actors in recent times! That young man nailed his role perfectly and conveyed his emotions well! You could tell when he was desperate, when he was nervous, when he was happy, when he was tensed, when he was scared, when he was in love etc! And every scene with him looked effortless! The chemistry between him and his love interest, Munachi Abii (Kelly) and his brother, Shawn Faqua (Tobe) was so real, their bond was believable.
Talking of old Nollywood actors, Kanayo.O.Kanayo (Chief Omego), Kenneth Okonkwo (Andy Okeke), Bob Manuel (Chief Mike), Zulu Adigwe (Nnamdi's foster dad), Ebere Okaro (Nnamdi's foster mom) and of course Ramsey Nouah (Richard Williams)! These people brought their A game as they have been doing for over two decades in the industry. Ramsey Nouah acted as the villain in the movie and he made occult look so good, he effortlessly switched from a billionaire business tycoon to an occult leader while commanding great charisma in both roles. I love that the 'demon' was good looking and not the typical ugly looking demon/villain. The occult scenes in the movie showed that yes, this is new Nollywood and we don't portray these evil scenes with all the scary sounds and images you grew up to know. The world has changed and so have we.
The use of bloggers instead of the police showed me that they were in tune with current trend. The same way we have bloggers who bring these sort of news to us, the movie played on that and I think they were spot on. They wanted us to know Nnamdi was desperate and we could literally see this from his very first scene where he tried to get into the VIP section of the club and leaving his job while trying to corner the clients of his former employers. You may miss it but I don't think it was coincidence that three people (his former colleague, his friend and his foster dad) told him "you too dey do pass yourself". You could literally see the twinkle in his eyes whenever he was close to anything that looked like wealth and although, the switch from poverty to wealth was sudden but it was perfectly done. He did not see random money on the road and became wealthy, nobody was in his cupboard vomiting money for him and all of that old Nollywood. He won a pitch and got paid for it and got to meet even richer people, signing deals like normal people do in real life.
The movie ended without us knowing who Richard Williams is and where he came from but I believe that is because there might be plans for another movie. Uzoma and even Nnamdi will definitely not go scot free. What I loved about the movie the most was the cinematography! It is a beautiful movie, the QUALITY is top notch! I loved the story and the casting was perfect! I left the cinema, ready to make cute ritualist babies with Nnamdi Okeke! I also don’t think the story has ended, I believe this is a foundation for more to come, I loved the acting, the blogger's character might have been exaggerated but for the most, I loved the acting! Again, Kudos to Swanky Jka! I loved the dialogue, I loved the songs and boy, the wealth! Save for Obinna jumping from his 18TH FLOOR PENTHOUSE, the movie was very realistic! I will watch again and I hope we see more movies like this and even better!
Swanky got a new fan in me and I’m definitely going to see whatever that guy acts going forward!
I will go see the movie, based on your recommendation. I hope I enjoy it as you have described.
ReplyDelete