TOLU

Tolu tells the story of a young girl who in order to prove herself valuable to the community embarks on a journey by herself into the sea to try and catch as many fish as possible and learns some life lessons in the process. For a helpful visual on what to expect; imagine if a feminist screenplay adaptation of The Old Man and the Sea was written by Wole Soyinka (and directed by Ang Lee channeling Life of Pi)

I have to begin with a caveat. I am a huge fan of short films. The reason is (and I’ve probably said countless times) because I believe that the short film might be the most difficult film medium to pull off. Why? Because short films have to juggle a precarious balance of being both condensed and light at the same time. They have to find a perfect and entertaining blend of being simple while often simultaneously pass across heavy messages. The short film Tolu produced and directed by Nadine Ibrahim struggles with this difficulty.

Within the first few lines of the first minute of the first conversation in the movie Nadine Ibrahim essentially wallops us over the head with the films message. It wasn’t a subtle metaphor as much as it is a billboard advertising its point, and this feeling seeps into the movies dialogue so it sometimes feels like a PSA/lecture about empowering the Nigerian girl child rather than just a movie about Tolu.

However, the film’s setting, production as well as video/audio quality are great and its minimalist direction is exceptional although at some moments the CGI was shaky/distracting and almost undoes the intimate feeling evoked in the first minutes of the film.

Halimat Olarenwaju’s performance as the titular Tolu isn’t the most comfortable but it is intensely confident and better than most child actors I’ve seen of recent (it helped that when she smiled she was adorable). In her defense, it didn’t help that her performance was literally juxtaposed against Wale Ojo’s which would be an unflattering contrast for most people in Nollywood. It was clear he was supposed to do the heavy lifting in the film but his performance was sort of like the movie itself – almost brilliant.

I often ask myself that “does the fact that a movie tells a powerful and positive message excuse its deficiencies? “ I ask this not because those sort of movies are supposed to be perfect but because people often act like they are.  In Tolu’s case, the answer is a clear yes, the movie is definitely worth your time. So ultimately, the next time you have ten minutes to spare, you should do yourself a favour. Don’t scroll through Twitter or Instagram but instead put on your headphones, go on YouTube and search for Tolu by Nadine Ibrahim. It’s almost certainly better than the last movie you saw.