Originally uploaded by NollywoodForever
Coincidence ~ 2008
Story – Maxwell Leonard
Screenplay – Maxwell Leonard & Akachukwu Ibeh
Director – Chimdi Chiama
Starring:
Patience Ozokwor – Nkechi
Oge Okoye – Mary
Nonso Diobi – Kingsley
St I.J – Johnson
Diewait Ikpechukwu – Okonkwo
Joy Helen – Ogochi
Ifeanyi Azodo – Don Christo
Kingsley Nnorom – Kelvin
Chizzy Okiche – Ann
Sandra Anosike – Ego
Elo Abokia – Mary 2
James Akabuogu – Ifeanyi
Jude Ugwueze – Rev Richards
Andy Offia – Rev Frank
Amarachi Chinwe – Sandra
Browny Igboegwu – John
Angel Stephen – Chrystal
Chinedu Dibor – Sgt Wife
Ngozi Onyemesi – Ndulue’s wife
King Uzor – Gabriel
Muj Bamidele – Manager
Themes Explored:
Rape
Murder
Forgiveness
Arranged Marriage
Religious Hypocrisy
Prostitution
My Rating 20%
Mary and Kingsley are childhood sweethearts. Mary’s mother is not in favour of the relationship as Mary has been promised to another man. The family are indebted to him as he put Mary through school and takes care of the family’s financial needs. Their families are virtually at war with each other and so they make the decision to keep their relationship on the down low and start meeting each other late at night when no one will see them.
The relationship is short lived as a series of events follows that changes the life course of all those involved.
I had high hopes for this film. I like all the main actors usually, Patience, Oge and Nonso. The film started well, but my instincts were completely wrong!
In the first scene we see Nkechi, Mary’s Mother fighting in her neighbour’s compound, She starts off the fight by asking,
“Where is your useless son?” before they two women begin tussling and trading insults.
The scene is bold and dramatic and makes you pay attention. Straight away we know Patience is playing the bad ass mother and that she doesn’t want her daughter seeing her neighbours’ son for whatever reason.
In the next scene we are introduced to Mary, played by Oge Okoye. We see her looking glum and pondering. We hear her introduction through internal monologue,
“My name is Mary; Mary Daniels. This is my true life story. A part of me I’d love to hate. A part of me I hate to share. Like my mother always said the road to hell is broad and attractive, before now I have lived my life differently.”
Mary has a story to tell about her life and if you want to watch the film you too will be tortured by the ridiculousness of it all.
*************SPOILERS*************
One night Mary and Kingsley meet late at night to meet in one of their meeting spots somewhere. Kingsley tells Mary a story that is about to change course of her life. He basically tells her a story about a girl called Mary who was raped by criminals who broke into her house. Not only that but her mother and sister were raped too and her father killed. He tells her the story just before they leave each other leaving her with a smile and a “Don’t worry baby! It’s just a story.”
Now correct me if I am wrong but what type of story is this? Why would you be telling a “story” like this in the first place? Where the hell did the concept for this film come from? Oh yeah Maxwell Leonard. He even got someone to collude with him on this sham of a movie and write a screenplay with him. Why would a man tell his girlfriend such a horrible story in the first place? And give the lead character that got raped in the story your girlfriend’s name? Oh and the girl that got raped had a sister too just like Mary does. What kind of man would do that?
Then to top it off the girl would just sit there, listen, nod and walk home by herself, not even yell “I reject it in Jesus name!” or “Tufiakwa!” or “Hell no It’s not my portion!”
Of course the story translates in real life and her house in broken into. She, her mother and sister are raped and her father is killed. Kingsley is accused of carrying out people to perpetrate the crime and hauled of to prison. He denies any involvement and Mary is devastated that he could carry out such a dastardly plan against her.
She decides to obey her mother’s wishes and marry Johnson, the man who put her through school, however he decides that he does not want to marry her. Without Johnson or her father’s support the family are soon in a dire financial situation and it is left up to Mary to provide.
By Part 2 Mary is a prostitute. We see no progression or how she ended up like this we just see her in a club drinking, smoking and picking up men.
Drug Abuse
Mary becomes a cokehead, and again we see an abysmal portrayal of drug taking. Mary puts some rocks into a sheet of paper rubs it together as if she is rolling a spliff, pours out the powder (the rocks have miraculously turned to powder with few rubs) onto the table and rubs her nose in it. No cutting of the drug into lines. No realism.
Religious Hypocrisy
She meets a Catholic Priest, who is one of her clients. She is in awe of him, even coming out with such nonsense like,
“I cannot imagine myself as dirty as I am to sleep in the same bed as an ordained man of God.”
Now why not? Is he not doing the same sinning as you? Or even worse since he is the one that made a vow to God.
It is not even clear if they have sexual relations with each other as this same man of God then says he has come into Mary’s life to deliver her from her life of sin… Yeah right. Only thing that would be more ridiculous then this whole scenario would be him telling Mary that she is the re-incarnated mother of Jesus. This is the same man that has a prostitute in his house and then goes ahead to leave the priesthood because he wants to marry her. NON-SENSE! HE then answers her and defends his actions by saying,
“We are all sinners, born into sin.” He even tells her as if to excuse his behaviour,
“You even share the same name with the holy mother.”
Mary has gotten herself involved with a drugs baron to ease her debts (I assume), as while prostituting she robbed a man and owes money.” She is stressed about the whole situation. Quite why I don’t know, her involvement with Don Christo is not explained properly. For reasons that are not completely understandable she tries to hang herself in the priest’s house and is caught just on time by him. At the hospital she finds out she is HIV, since when? This storyline does not even tie into anything.
At the end we find out that it was the priest that raped Mary, her sister and mother and it was Johnson who sent them. Now why would Johnson have sent a band of robbers to rape Mary? This was before he even came to take her hand in marriage. Utter utter stupidity! We don’t get any timeline but from bad boy cultist in university and a robber/rapist a man becomes a fully fledged priest. Na wa o! Even giving a gap of two years in between the rape and the priest meeting Mary, that is not enough time for a proper transition.
On knowing Kingsley is innocent Mary rushes to the jail to go and save him. She, her mother and sister beg him for forgiveness. He is really laid back and tells them,
“To err is to human, to forgive is divine.”
Now lets think about it. You have been locked up for who knows how long and your parents have been killed as a result of you being a supposed rapist (their murder made no sense either) and you are sitting there so relaxed and chilled. RO-BBISH! They are all happy that they have been forgiven and then Kingsley announces,
“Hey there is a party waiting for us at my house.”
They all rejoice at his announcement and the film ends. This was the stupidest ending ever. The whole thing was ridiculous.
I would definitely not recommend this film. Not only was the story stooooopid from beginning to end it was boring and draggy. I watched it in four different sittings because I kept falling asleep. Oge and Patience tried their best you could tell, however there was but there is so much they could do in TRASH. Chizzy Okiche was flat and lifeless and Jude Ugueze as the priest was pretty unconvincing. The music was too loud for the dialogue most of the time. There was a was a 7 minutes club scene with Yahooze blaring in the background where there was dialogue that I could not make out. The time line was not even vaguely clear. They tried to bring in too may subplots that were poorly executed. Overall the whole thing was sloppy sloppy SLOPPY. I salute myself for even managing to get through it!
Nolly I swear, I know how much you love Nonso, but any boyfriend tells me such useless talk we are done. I don't remember them raping Patience.
I also found the Pastor thing disturbing. Why would he be picking up "pros".
Finally, they expect us to believe that this is a true story.....
- spam
- offensive
- disagree
- off topic
Like