Unguarded

There are trailers you see and you are certain that you will not be watching that movie, for me this was one of them. Unfortunately, decisions about whether or not I will be watching those movies are not entirely in my hands so I did end up watching it. In the end, “unguarded” was not half as bad as I thought it would be… at least for a Nollywood in USA flick.

Now this is why it was not half as bad, there was a story – it was cognitive, there were people in the movie – they are called actors, and there was an end – it made sense. Now was that story new, insightful or immensely entertaining? Not really. Were these people called ‘actors’ doing much acting? No, not really. And was the end anything other than what was expected? Again, not really.

Unguarded tells the story of a young man who is so beaten by his past heartbreak that he ‘supposedly’ goes around the world breaking the hearts of different girls from different ethnicities. By the way, if you ask me from the way it was rendered I’d just say he went down the streets of LA. He had a Jamaican, Indian, Hispanic, White, Black and African ex, and if you’ve ever been on public transit in LA you know you can cast for all that in one trip – but I digress.

He is very comfortable in his newly attained glorified role as a casanova until he meets this one girl, played by Uche Jombo. The casanova obviously is played by Ramsey Nouah, Nollywood’s own anointed all-purpose-casanova. In fact, Mr. Nouah has certified his casanova status in a previous movie in which he plays – well you guessed it – a casanova alongside Uche Jombo yet again.

The fact is this movie has been made before. Not only has it been made before and by Nigerians but also by the same actors. This is just a lower quality, fewer parts, more terrible extras, different location version of many movies.

The story, in and of itself, was direct and to the point thankfully. The development was adequate considering that there really wasn’t that much to the story, it was quite simplistic and basic. There were some people in this movie that, God-knows, do not need to ever be acting in their lifetime and then there were others whose mere presence in the movie was a disappointment but I must say that I really loved the girl that plays Ramsey’s initial fiance.

Most extras in this movie couldn’t act and thankfully did not have many lines. But even the actors that we know of were quite underwhelming in this movie. Now I can’t say that I can blame them entirely for that, the story really doesn’t require you to do much. The truth is that for me I was watching the movie for Chet Anekwe. I never thought the day would come that a movie would have a cast like this and I would say a thing like that but it’s the fact, I only saw this movie because of Chet Anekwe and I feel duped. I feel duped because he wasn’t even really in the movie that much. But Chet brings a certain something to the screen that I still can’t place my finger on.

All in all, the experience of watching unguarded is not so much disappointing as it is underwhelming because it’s not really a movie you come into with high expectations.