Crying Freeman

-Originality: [2 out of 5] I started watching this movie and I, again, got that “Who Killed Pa Reuben” vibe that I had gotten from “Turn Me On” (but that’s probably because Nollywood does not make many movies in this genre). Regardless, it was quite original… the end however was not original

-Predictability: [1 out of 5] So, I was going with this movie… really into it… sitting here cracking my head wondering… who is the culprit? And as the movie progressed and the culprit was about to be revealed, I was really pissed that the resolution to the mystery was so simplistic and cliched. Maybe it’s just my desire for intrigue speaking, but that ending was almost as bad as ending the movie with “it was all just a dream”. In other words, I wanted more… I wanted complicated… I wanted intriguing… I wanted different. And all I got was cliches.

-Directing/Editing: [1 out of 5] When a movie starts and less than 20 minutes in Mercy Johnson dies, you don’t have to be a genius to know that the entire thing is about to be a flashback (either that or she has a twin sister). So having that at the back of my head, I was already waiting for the flashback 20 minutes in. But when it started, I didn’t know it was a flashback (for a minute there I thought MJ’s character had a twin and that was the spin the movie was taking). The progression from mourning husband to beginning of flashback was not well presented. The continuity in this movie was questionable for the most part… The camera action was a bit warped in some scenes. And also it did not make any sense to me that the scene where Jibola Dabor has this dream where he sees MJ’s character and calls her by her name (Bianca) came before the scene where her brother told him her name. And in the beginning, the dialogues seemed really wordy. It was a bit like watching a Nigerian political debate (i.e use of plenty big words that nobody, not even those saying it, know the meaning of).

-Acting quality: [4 out of 5] One thing I loved about this movie was the actors and their roles. It was good to see Yul as something other than a prince, to see Eve as something other than a whore, and to see Jibola as something other than a king. It brought out a side of each actor that was not commonplace. I thought everyone killed it from Mercy to Jibola to Yul to Walter to Eve to Chioma… amazing acting. The extras were a bit mediocre, and the guy who played Duke, MJ’s character’s brother, needs to work a bit more on being convincing.

-Setting: [2 out of 5] Loved everything except the DPO’s office and that shower curtain on the side of it.

-Costume/Make-Up: [3 out of 5] Well done

-Video Quality: [0 out of 5] I absolutely hated the lighting

-Soundtrack: [3 out of 5] Not one original soundtrack but a mix of songs (that were, by the way, not credited). The songs in this movie were: Ijoba Orun by Lara George; Write me a letter by Maoli; Oyi (remix) by Flavour and Tiwa Savage; Ko ma si by Lara George