Masquerades

I’ve never understood African comedies and have never been a fan. They all seem to start from nowhere and arrive at nowhere. However, this one is a bit different in that even though it does start at nowhere (the beginning wasn’t really encouraging) but it successfully arrives at somewhere or almost somewhere.

The first couple of scenes are mild attempts at humor, some successful others not so much. An old man dies in the presence of two men, one seems eager to save his ‘uncle’ and the other just seems reluctant to do anything to help. So from scene one suspicions arise in the mind of the viewer about the uncaring Nick.

A family member returns from the United States in all her glitz and glamour. She is shown strutting out of the airport with a high-handedness about her as she scolds an elderly woman who accidentally knocked her purse over “do you know how much this purse cost me?”

Two or more scenes later we are introduced to the character Tunde and the story spirals from there. Much of the movie is centered around pretenses and false lives. From fake accents, to borrow-pose to wearing clothes that are just a little too tight.

The first 40-50 minutes are much of a drag. It took a lot of convincing myself to sit through it, however the story eventually picks up pace in the second half when we eventually realize what the plot is about, who the antagonist is, why he’s antagonizing in the first place and so on and so forth.

Unoriginal as the basic framework is, it still succeeds in giving a couple laughs here and there. One thing that was intended to be funny but came off entirely irritating was Tunde’s accent; even a beggar under the bridge could decipher the ‘fake’ in that so I don’t understand how one who spent so long in America was fooled by it.

Speaking of things that made no sense, the height of the ridiculousness was the mysterious caller scene. In this scene, Nick (the bad guy) calls Kwesi with an unknown number and tries to mask his voice with a hanky on the other end. But even before the camera revealed the ‘mysterious’ caller, the viewer can tell from the voice that it’s Nick calling. However, for some reason Kwesi couldn’t. And then Nick proceeds to give Kwesi directions to where he needs to come in order to find out something ‘very important’ and then he categorically states:

“When you get there, call me back on this number?”

Pause! But you called on a private number…

Lydia delivers the laughs, scene after scene after scene. I can’t but agree with a comment that says this actress is highly underrated. She’s come a long way since her days of “Scorned” (which was a terribly terrible movie, for lack of a better word) and if there’s one thing you can’t deny about her is that she owns the camera, she possess it.

I could not get past Desmond Elliot’s fake accent rendition. It irked me so much so that I can’t think of anything else besides that.

Senanu is a delight to watch and his boyish charm is without an expiry date.

I’ve never seen Adjetey in a negative role: his facial expressions were crisp even though his character was unfortunately armed with one of the most ridiculous motives in the history of screenplay.

With it’s hasty love side story and awkward kissing scenarios, ‘Masquerades’ is altogether a fair enough watch.

Trailer: