Recently, there has been an upsurge of Nollywood (Nigerian movies) on Netflix, good news right? I have had the privilege of watching a few and I wrote about some of them. As it is often said, when you don’t have anything nice to say, don’t say anything at all, so I decided to hold my peace on others. However, I saw the trailer of a sequel to one of the movies and decided to break my silence.
I previously did a post on King of Boys and The Wedding Party 2. I have since watched some others and here are my thoughts on them;
Merry Men – The real Yoruba Demons
Having watched 10 days in Sun City and now Merry Men, it is very obvious that Ayo Makun loves action movies. Nothing wrong with that, the problem here is the action is most times unnecessary. A perfect example is the scene where Ramsey Nouah’s character confronted Jim Iyke’s Character, and then his sister jumping in to take the bullet and in comes the authority and there was a shoot out… Really! What in the grizzlies (sorry just had to chip that in, its something my littlest is always saying 😁).
Anyway, what saved the movie for me was some good acting from Ramsey, RMD and Iretiola. Jim Iyke just amuses me anyway, and I always love seeing Falz in a movie, he’s a treasure that one. Whilst I ended the movie wondering why they were still freemen after that shoot out, trying to get over Rosy Meurer’s bad acting and really trying to make sense of the script, I see a trailer for a sequel 😬. I just really hope it’s a better-written plot.
Mums at War
I watched this movie expecting a very good story and performance. I got one and not the other. The performance was quite good, watching the teenage children was even more enjoyable for me. The story itself was not bad, bearing in mind that mums will do anything for their children, but they lost the plot somewhere. I kept wondering why none of the main actresses could say something about the story being too far fetched! It wasn’t a bad watch though – if you can stomach the cheesiness, Omoni and Funke delivered some entertaining performance.
Mokalik
I watched this movie right after I saw someone’s post about their disappointment at it. The person expressed their feeling of dissatisfaction based on the fact that the director, Kunle Afolayan always delivers solid movies. I became curious – as I do agree that he makes good movies, so I watched Mokalik expecting to be disappointed too 😁. Surprisingly, I liked the movie. I do get where my friend was coming from though, after getting used to Kunle’s big movie plots like October 1, Figurine etc, his latest piece of work was almost like a documentary. It was a birds-eye view into the life of everyday men and women, in this case, a mechanic’s workshop was the setting. It was homely, sincere and original. You could tell a lot of research went into it, I really liked it.
New Money
The plot like a lot of Nollywood movie seemed far-fetched but it could pass as anything is possible 😊. My problem with this movie is that I struggled to like the main character. Not that Jemima Osunde didn’t play it well, she did a great job but maybe it’s the dialogue there’s just something not right about the main character for me. As usual, Falz was a delight to watch even though I felt like slapping his character a few times. It wasn’t a bad watch, just a regular home movie.
Up North
I’d heard a lot of good things about this movie so I went into it expecting to be wowed 😁. If nothing, it makes me regret not embracing my time at NYSC camp wholeheartedly 😁 and makes me want to visit Bauchi. I think we should have more movies that show the beauty and culture of Nigeria and the diversity as well, Up North ticks the box here. Apart from that, it was a bit flat for me but I think this happened because of my very high expectations. Don’t even know what else to say 😁. Not a bad movie altogether, watch it, beautiful people 😘.
Conclusion
It’s very obvious that Nollywood keeps improving especially in terms of cinematography, Sound mix, Light and effects. But we seem to be forgetting to put more effort into the plot and Dialogue. This requires a lot of work too. Some have gotten it right and there are some improvements, but more needs to be done.
I also watched “In my Country” it was a very compelling watch but I’m too tired to write on it😁. Go and watch it and let me know what you think 😉. If there’s any movie you want me to share my thoughts on please do let me know.
Please don’t forget to share your opinion and let me know any topic you want me to write on.
Aunty Lulu.
