Tailor My Heart

There is a nollywood formula that you see a lot of in nollywood movies, especially the kind that ends up on YouTube. It’s that whole rich guy falls for poor girl thing. Sometimes it works, other times it falls flat on its derriere, but occasionally…. occasionally you get Tailor My Heart. It’s not the embodiment of originality, it’s not oscar-worthy acting or directing, it’s not visuals to rival Avatar, it just feels like a very well cooked pot of native soup on a cool and breezy evening.

Tailor My Heart is the quintessential rich guy and poor girl storyline. A wealthy “Oga Nkem” (Frederick Leonard) first meets the lowly seamstress, Tochi (Lota Chukwu) at his designer/tailor’s shop. She has just ruined his ‘expensive’ clothes and so he gets her fired from the job. One thing leads to another and they cross paths time and time again until that initial hate for each other starts to melt away to reveal a love story. Somehow they end up under the same roof and Oga Nkem has to face his inner demons and choose between his pride and ego versus accepting his love for a common ‘tailor’. Hence, tailor my heart! (I know you are cringing but it’s really quite sweet)

As initially mentioned, nobody is watching this for originality. It’s hard to say what exactly it is about this movie that makes it work. I believe a strong part of it is how it manages to feel earthy. It feels like a nollywood movie of old. Not to the extent of “Family Man” but just enough that it’s earned a Sunday afternoon – with your rice and stew – watch. It’s the way Frederick Leonard navigates that line between arrogant and enticing. He yells a bit more than he needs to most times, the gra-gra can get a bit annoying, but none of it is ever enough to cause you to turn it off. Lota is not at her best here but she’s also not at her worst. You know how it is going to end so that’s not the surprise but the process of getting there is worth a watch.