Displaced

In Displaced, a barrister meets a widow as she’s mourning for her late husband to inform her that the house that she is living in had been sold by said late husband. In the same afternoon, she also learns that said late husband had a WHOLE wife and a WHOLE kid (to be particular – a son) who lived in the UK and had returned to claim the same house. When they followed this with the revelation that said late husband was named ‘Emenike’, I couldn’t help but fear my igbo brothers.

Our widow, Chisom, reaches out to multiple people for a place to stay and is turned down repeatedly. She quickly learns that her husband’s friends, who she assumed were “our friends” were simply only his friends. When the barrister, Ken, comes to close the gate on the house, she still has no place to go and out of the kindness of his heart he decides to house her until she finds a more permanent solution. Your guess is as good as mine as to how that situation ends.

We enter his home and turns out that he is separated from his wife and is raising his teenage daughter alone. His teenage daughter, Urie, is determined to reunite her parents and as such doesn’t take kindly to the addition of another woman to the home. So she begins her exploits in an attempt to get Chisom out.

Chisom is played by Lota Chukwu and I remember my first impression from her first scene in this movie. She is in a living room bawling and surrounded by two friends. One of the friends try to motivate her to find her strength and Lota responds a squeal about how her husband was her strength. My first impression then was “Oh God no, are we going to have to listen to this squealing for the next 105 minutes?” However, the thought didn’t get the opportunity to even settle in my head before Lota jumps into action and evicts all opportunities for doubt. Is there room for growth? There sure is, but did Lota convince in her role? She definitely does.

Then there is our lover boy of life – Blossom Chukwujekwu. We haven’t seen too much of him lately so some might have forgotten how skilled he is. But Blossom wastes no time in reminding the audience. He dominates the screen in each take and possesses the shot. Our greatest surprise in this movie is Kelly Ochonogor who plays Urie – the teenage daughter. For an industry that barely does enough for the child actor, she’s a gift sent directly from heaven. She does a great job convincing and it didn’t take too many scenes for me to start hating her character.

Remembering that it is simply intended as a romantic movie is essential to enjoying this movie and loving the final couple. Because if you don’t remember this then you’ll find yourself asking questions like “Was she moving out of her house of 5 years with just 1 and a half boxes?” “I thought she was supposed to be with them for only a few days?” “Why is she so quick to trust another man who is not even hiding the fact that the principal reason he is into her is because of her home-keeping skills and that she is a woman?” “So… is she going to get a job now or nah?” “So… I guess she is just fine with depending on another man right away?” Ok o *sip my tea*… but like I said, it’s a romance.

Needless to say that the charm of this movie is not its unpredictable nature. The charm is in the mood it creates, it’s in the electric energy between Blossom and Lota in their scenes, it’s in the excitement that the makers were able to create in the audience from watching the family unit.

There’s a chance you won’t remember this movie in a year but you’ll always remember the chemistry between the leads.