Movie Review: For Real

Title: For real

Starring: Dakore Egbuson, Eucharia Anunobi, Desmond Elliot, Kalu ikeagwu, Justus Esiri, Remi Abiola, Ekwi Owuneme

Producer(s): Emem Isong

Director: Aquilla Njamah

Year of production: 2005

Country: Nigeria

Genre: Drama/Romance

Language: English


Preamble: First let me admit that I came upon this one by accident. I stumbled on it one day when I was slacking off. I was going to ignore it, but then I checked it out and it appeared to have garnered rave reviews, though I had never seen it, or even heard of it. So I watched it. Holy Moly!! FA BU LOUS. One of my very favorite Nigerian movies ever! EVER! It was engaging, interesting, intriguing, realistic, very well done. I dropped everything I was doing, and could not stop watching. It sucked me right in.


Trailer:


Summary: Eucharia Anunobi plays Divine, a widowed mother of one, and she is in Abuja on business. There she meets David Salako (played by Kalu), a much younger man who persistently pursues her. She gives in after some objections (and some alcohol), and they have a one night stand. He leaves her his number but she decides never to see him again. She has no interest in keeping it going. All she wanted to do was scratch her itch and live out some fantasies. After she returns to Lagos where she is based, her son (played by Desmond Elliot) comes home with his fiancée (Ekwi) from the UK, She has a party to celebrate his graduation and his intended nuptials, and meet his friends. She has the shock of her life when her son’s best friend turns out to be someone she has met before. Things become very, very interesting.

Review
Positives: Please do not be put off by the really bad title. It does this great work no justice at all. I would have called this one the Couger, or Old Wine (better with age), or something like that. Looks like someone just pulled the title out of their nose “For Real”!! Having said that though, this was Kalu’s first movie (as he states here ), and that is darned impressive! Boy did he act the living daylights out of this role. What talent, what swagger, what charm! Two thumbs way up for this role. In fact, everyone impressed me. Eucharia was fantastic as the cougar struggling with the social ramifications of loving a young buck, Desmond was fierce as the overprotective son, Dakore was fabulous as David’s fiancé, and Ekwi was just so pretty as Angela, Divine’s daughter-in-law to be. The casting for this movie was almost perfect. I especially loved Mrs Remi Abiola (RIP) in the role of Mrs Salako, looking out for her son. When her big scene came up, I paid attention. She was regal, and angry, and she worked it. This movie – it was great!! I did not use the fast forward button once on this movie. Not once. No wasted scenes. Even the “I love you” toritese (head and leg) scenes were bearable.

Negatives: The weak link was the guy who was chasing after Dakore’s character. First of all, he was so not necessary to the development of the story. Second of all, the guy cannot act to save his life, his diction was bad, and I just could not figure out what he was doing in there! Also, they spent a lot of time talking about David buying a car, and then you finally see the car and you are like – really? That’s it? Blah!! Of course, as in many Nigerian movies, you had to do the volume thing – turn it up for conversations, turn it down when someone was shouting. And the picture quality could have been better.

Lessons/Worldview: I love this movie, I will not lie. It is so well done. I have watched it several times, and I just loved it more and more each time!! I would not claim that it teaches any deep life changing lessons – except to provide yet another argument against indiscriminate sex!! – But it does lead to interesting questions about Cougar relationships. So we expect that in relationships, the man be older than the woman, or they be close in age, at least in the African context. When the woman is much older, is it unbearable? When is an age difference too much? Or does it really depend on the individuals involved? Is love enough in non traditional relationships? This issue is discussed in more detail here

Other reviews of this movie can be found here

RATING: 8/10

AVAILABILITY: Unfortunately, I don’t know where you can get an original copy of this movie in the diaspora. I apologise. I hype it so much and it is unavailable. Your options are either you buy a copy in Nigeria (if you can), or you can call and ask any of the big three if they have it. Sorry.