Migration And Two Nigerian Films

Nollywood has fed me this past week.

Hello my people and a happy new year!

The free trial month is almost over and as I type this, the only thing on my mind is that run Beyoncé did at the end of Drunk In Love to close her private show in Dubai. Every time I watch a Beyoncé performance I feel rejuvenated and inspired to do my best work, her ability to constantly top already elaborate arrangements reminds me that perfection is constantly striven for. Truly an icon, the moment and the greatest to ever do it.

Okay, that’s enough, I’m not about to get *too* inspired, that sounds stressful.

Over the past few weeks, I’ve watched a lot of stuff in a bid to survive med school. I finished seven seasons of Veep—an irreverent political satire that elevates the art of insults and roasts, I finally got to watch Aftersun, a beautifully crafted film about the evolution of memory and the way we look back on our parents. I also saw The Menu, a tasty exploration of toxic restaurant culture; and The Fabelmans, a semi-autobiography about the way Spielberg processes life by looking through a lens. Out of everything I watched, two things stood out: Dika Ofoma’s A JAPA TALE (you can watch it here) and Arie and Chuko Esiri’s Eyimofe, available on Amazon Prime. Both of these films have been on my mind and what better way to interrogate my thoughts than to write about them, so, let’s start with Eyimofe.

Lagos, in film, is almost always a garish feast. Your eyes stretch at the corners—eyeballs bulging—as you try to take it all in, but soon you start to feel a kind of visual constipation. The vibrant clashing colours begin to sicken, the Lekki- Ikoyi link bridge tires you, and the pretence of wealth is almost nauseating.

Eyimofe understands this and avoids it by feeding you visuals of Lagos in small delicious morsels as stories of small triumphs and large losses unfold delicately. From the filter through which it is shot—heralding a certain vintage feel in the present, to the natural dialogue and the loudness of things unsaid, Eyimofe takes you to a Lagos that is familiar in reality but strange to Nollywood.

A random screenshot of a scene I really liked from Eyimofe.

Something I am always thinking of is how film is primarily a visual medium and how Nollywood films sometimes never know where to reign it in or show out. A scene revealing a romantic interest is shot so rigidly and another scene meant to frighten is in the end confusing. There is no much attention paid to a colour scheme and frames are stacked on each other like a jenga game that has gone on too long. Eyimofe defies all of this to create scenes that are beautiful and potent in their imagery. Each one seems carefully moulded with deliberate colours and blocking while still giving a powerful portrayal of real stories.

The film also excels story wise as it excels visually. Following the lives of two people trying to survive the tragedy of Nigeria, you would expect their stories to meet at some point and create some elaborate plot, but no. The two stories interact ever so briefly at different points almost mirroring the ways our lives lightly touch each other. This film, to me, is not a happy film; it exposes something we are all too familiar with—the Nigerian brand of heartbreaking perseverance, our collective echo of “we move” despite the forces preventing us from actually moving.

The ending of this film shows, to me, the way disappointment is gendered in society. None of the main characters achieve their major goals so they have to settle, but Mofe settles for a shop he owns while Rosa’s personhood is tied to a man— a disappointing but real ending for women.

Eyimofe also addresses many Nigerians’ hope in migration and the sacrifices we make for that dream only for it to sometimes be dashed. It is a kind of failure to launch migration story.

Which brings me to A JAPA TALE, also a migration story but one that launches while taking a look at the damage being left behind by it. Dika’s latest short film continues with his mastery of the dynamics of being in love as a Nigerian (as an aside, let Dika write a romcom please or a romance film with a happy ending, I know he likes sad stories but I need to see a full length film with a couple he writes).

Onyinye Odokoro gives an attention grabbing performance of a woman that refuses to be swayed while her heart breaks multiple times. In the twenty seven minutes of this film, I first disliked and then loved the boyfriend’s mother written so deftly showing the ways older Nigerian women might not understand the ways women are living their lives now, but will still offer glimpses of solidarity (I thought both women wearing yellow during that argument scene was so neat! I dunno if it was deliberate).

Dika’s film is far from perfect, you can still see the rough edges but not rough edges that annoy you, they are the ones you’re excited for him to trim in his next film because you know you are watching someone that cares deeply for his art. Once again, you can watch his film here.

Both of these films have made me think a lot about the ways migration has influenced the Nigerian experience. Migration to us is a tool for survival, but that tool is also a severing knife. We leave our families, or culture, our rituals and things that tether us to each other replacing them with screens of different sizes, trying to replicate things that require a physicality virtually. It breaks my heart.

Before I leave, let’s resume our usual segments.

What I’ve been listening to.

I haven’t strayed from familiar music a lot this year so I haven’t discovered anything new but A House In Nebraska by Ethel Caine and Ready For You by Black Coffee featuring Celeste are songs I’ve listened to a lot these days.

What I’ve been watching.

I am currently watching Netflix’s Kaleidoscope which intrigues me only because of the instruction that all the episodes except one can be watched in any order. I’m three episodes in and I don’t know exactly how I feel yet. I’m also watching the Showmax original, Crime and Justice. It borrows from Hollywood’s police procedural format but it understands that a Nigerian translation should carry our nuance and it’s also beautifully shot.

What I’ve been thinking about.

I’ve been having some health issues recently so I had to go back to the hospital and repeat some tests, it felt like I was picking at the scab of old wounds. I’m much better now, but this whole cycle of sickness and health has made me wonder how majority of existence is just getting life drawn out of you in an ironic bid for you to stay longer. You burnout just because you’re trying to make more money and not suffer, you are exhausted every day from doctors poking and prodding you so you can live, etc. In the end, we never really live full lives. We might be present, breathing, but our minds and bodies would have suffered for this half existence.

In these times I am grateful for those that still pour life into us. We are all managing but we still find ways to share ourselves with others, giving ourselves moments of full existence because we are choosing to exist with others and allowing others to exist with us, this half existence becoming full for a while.

That’s all for now, I hope you have a wonderful week ahead and you can always write to me, I love reading your responses.