Battle on Buka Street

Battle on Buka Street (BOBS) is a nollywood feel good slap stick comedy about two daughters from a polygamous family: Awele (Mercy Johnson) and Yejide (Funke Akindele). They inherit an intense rivalry from their mothers (Sola Sobowale and Tina Mba) who are both co-wives of Mazi Maduka (Nkem Owoh). And this rivalry leads both of them to do amusingly silly things and sometimes intensely dangerous ones too.

One of the biggest surprises here is that the movie BOBS is actually based on a solid storyline. And despite the slap-stick nature of the entire production, the writer manages to tell a story about these characters in a way that is truly endearing. The main problem is though that at about 140minute runtime, this movie could have managed to successfully tell its story, produce the laughs and create the emotional connection in a lot less time. Instead, many scenes and trials are drawn out in a way to truly test the patience of the audience member. The final moments of the movie with the reintroduction of Femi Jacobs character is really the heart of the movie. Femi and Funke’s chemistry in the movie alongside the children manage to pull the heart into the film and ground the entire storyline. It also comes in at a good point as the audience is already exhausted from all the quarrelling scenes earlier.

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Going into BOBS looking for anything other than cheap laughs with familiar and loved nollywood faces is truly a recipe for disaster. If you already know about yourself that this sort of comedy is not for you then do not bother pressing play because there is no singular shred of intelligent comedy here. Otherwise, for its target audience BOBS does succeed at achieving all it aims for. It brings a pure market woman vibe and does a good job of pulling the audience into the world of the characters. Buka Street is truly built out and watching the sisters battle each other from across the street adds more power to the stakes.

The actors in BOBS bring the laughs. Nkem Owoh is fully hilarious simply by existing and his character in this movie is no different. It was quite uncanny how the actor who played the younger version of him truly sounded like him word for word and expression for expression. Sola Sobowale and Tina Mba as the warring wives are effortless. Funke Akindele and Mercy Johnson as the daughters who inherit the squabbles are sufficiently chaotic. And the actors who play Ademide (Moshood Fattah) and Ifunanya (Uche Obunse) are truly sweet to watch on camera.

Battle on Buka Street had a good start and a good ending but that middle could have been mostly hacked out and left behind. However, none of it takes away from the fact that it’s a fun simplistic nollywood feel good comedy.