Living In Bondage – Breaking Free

If there’s one thing old nollywood has over new nollywood everyday – and twice on Sundays – it’s storytelling. And this 2019, sequel to the nollywood classic “Living In Bondage” downloads some of that old charm alongside all the fancy tuneups of new nollywood. From ‘the Brotherhood’ to ‘the six’, from Lucifer to the Dark Lord, from Lagos to Durban and from Andy to Nnamdi everything is upgraded in this sequel.

In this sequel, Andy Okeke’s son – Nnamdi Okeke (played by Swanky JKA) – finds himself quickly towing the path of his father when he is ensnared into the world of the rich and powerful by the business tycoon, Richard Williams. Williams, played by Ramsey Nouah, also happens to be the new chief priest of the evolved brotherhood – which has now come to be known as ‘The Six’.

The writers here have the stiff challenge of condensing a story sequence that originally took 5 hours to enact into a mere two and a half hour long film, and they do a good job of it. They manage to draw in all of the old nostalgia while also creating a new flavor. The old is very well represented with the presence of the original characters like Chief Omego (Kanayo O. Kanayo), Chief Mike (Bob Manuel Udokwu) and Andy Okeke (Kenneth Okonkwo), and even in the moments when some of the old dialogues of Andy is reused by Nnamdi (like the “you didn’t explain this thing to me properly” quote). The new flavors of the nostalgia, though, is something to definitely applaud. It’s not just in the addition of characters like Ndidi Obi (with the character name of Nneka as a nod to her previous work), it’s in the shots of the two brothers running through the village to go and meet their parents. It’s in how simple shots like that create excitement of what’s to come while also creating a distinct flavor that’s set apart from the fancy scenes that are still to come.

The storyline and the writing itself has so many beautiful nods in the dialogues and the themes it creates. One of the biggest themes in the “Living In Bondage” series is that of relationships. In the original, the relationship between Merit and Andy leads to all the rising action and drama in the end, here also the relationship between Nnamdi and Kelly might make you want to pull over the nearest Igbo guy so you can listen to Oliver De Coque with him while sipping palm wine. While Kelly (played by Munachi Abii) might not be the greatest actress in all her scenes – especially in the scenes that require hefty emotions where you can clearly see the struggle in her eyes, she still does an admirable job of embodying a character that you can’t help but love. The relationship theme doesn’t die off with the romances though, the bond between Nnamdi and his brother Toby is also part of the many little writing nudges that makes the audience so attached to the character of Nnamdi.

However, nothing causes attachment to the character of Nnamdi as much as the performance of the actor who plays him. Nnamdi is brought to life by Jidekene Achufusi, also known as Swanky JKA. For those who still frequent the streets of Asaba made nollywood films, you might recognize him; and for the others he might seem like a new face. The first thing that stands out about Swanky is how incredibly flexible of an actor he is. He moves so seamlessly from hype to broken, from ‘turned up’ to village boy, from driving Ferrari’s to catching the morning bus, and everything in between. He bodies the role of this freshly imported Igbo boy in the city just trying to make it – it’s hard to say if that’s because he’s that good of an actor or if it’s because it’s who he actually is.

The original work is hailed as the first nollywood movie and was shot in Igbo for the most part – the characters, the dialogues, the costumes and everything in between. While this version is not as purely Igbo as that, after watching the film it’s easy to understand why its not. The film has adapted the principles of the original film – such as greed and selfishness – which are timeless, and placed it into our current time in a believable manner. This version is not devoid of the Igbo language, but instead its placed in a manner that is reflective of the times while still exalting the culture. If you step back from the language question, you realize that everything about this film is rawly Igbo – from the cast members, to the production team, to the soundtrack and most of the music used. It still honors the legacy of the original film.

Now all that glitters isn’t gold so let’s talk about the pitfalls of this film. One of the quickest ones to catch on to are the visual effect moments. The moments like the Ferrari scene where the ‘green-screen-ness’ (so to speak) of the scene almost jumps out at you. There are those moments and then there are the shots like the haunting ones of Kosi with Obinna and you wonder if you are watching the same film. And then there is David Jones. David plays the role of Uzoma – the inquisitive blogger who is determined to bring down the brotherhood. To state it simply, David seemed to be attempting a take on some very specific Hollywood film character and he failed woefully in every scene.

And finally there’s our music. While I loved the music of this film, especially the little girl’s song that the film starts with, there’s something to be said about new nollywood’s obsession with packing films chuck full of popular Nigerian songs. We are overly dependent on them as tools of connection to the audience, and this is present here as well when barely five minutes into the movie and there’s already been 4-5 different popular songs laced in.

All that aside, Living In Bondage is a delight to watch and the morale of the story is still the same – don’t fall in love with a ritualist!