Heat Of The Moment

Originally uploaded by NollywoodForever

Heat of the Moment ~ 2009
Story – Innocent Isiakpu
Screenplay – Innocent Isiakpu & Prince Samson Onyejiuwa
Director – Prince Samson Onyejiuwa
Producer – Martina N. Okafor

Starring:
Emeka Ike – Dr Richard
Mercy Johnson – Anna
Kofi Adjorlolo – Chief Douglas
Emma Ayalogu – Chief Magnus
Cassandra Odita – Mrs Adams
Patience Oseni – Mrs Douglas
Vitalis Ndubuisi – Mr Adams
Barry Lukeman – Barrister James
Amanda Ebeye – Rita
Amina Atairu – Vivian
Peachman Akputa – Ben

Themes:
Rape
Politics
Mistaken Identity

My Rating – 33%

Anna claims that she was raped by local politician and human rights activist Dr Richards while walking home late one night. He, however is adamant that he never even saw her at any time let alone touched her. Who is telling the truth? His family believe it is a set up at the hands of his political opponents, whilst Anna has the back up of her best friend who claims to have been present at the time of the rape.

*************SPOILERS*************

The beginning of the movie is boring beyond belief. I rewound uncountable times because it just wasn’t holding my attention and I kept getting distracted… made a cup of coffee, tweeted, went on Facebook. I say grab the viewer early! So that even if later on the film gets a bit rubbish their attention will have already been snared. I only actually started properly paying attention about 25 minutes in when Anna got into an argument on the street with a random man.

The movie slowly starts getting more interesting after the rape, only slightly though, not too much. It was still rather slow and I fell asleep more than once. There was a rituals part that I didn’t get. Perhaps it didn’t make sense or maybe I wasn’t paying close enough attention. Who knows?
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Doctor James is put on trial for the rape and he is cross questioned by none other than *drumroll please* Barrister James, Anna’s boyfriend. How can the rapist be questioned by the raped one’s boyfriend? This is pure nonsense. That could never happen in real life! I have seen this sort of scenario in a few films and it is just foolish. They need to stop.

In the end we see Anna in jail telling a group of convicts her story. We then cut to seeing her released. The ending was sudden and we don’t find out how Doctor Richard’s DNA came to be on her person if he was not actually the one that raped her or not. Maybe it is a twin story. Maybe it is a ghost story. It looks like there will probably be a part 3 and 4. Either way I won’t be watching to find out.

This is one of the only movies where the issue of “light” is brought up. So a *round of applause* for that. Anna is watching Doctor Richards on TV talking about the “light problem” and the lights go off. I haven’t seen lights go off in a movie before and considering that lack of electricity is a widespread and major problem in Nigeria I’m surprised there is less talk of NEPA in the movies. NEPA affects all Nigerians’ everyday life, why is it never mentioned? Is it censorship?
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I would not recommend this movie. I found the pace too slow and the movie draaaaagged and draaaaaaagged and draaaaaaaaaaaged. When I was almost at the end of part 2 I wanted to press the eject button but thought that I may as well watch until the end since I had come so far. It didn’t make a bit of difference. I came away feeling that I had just wasted 2+ hours of my life. Nollywood Production, Nigerian Movie, African Movie, Ghanaian Actor, Nigerian Cinema, Nigerian Actresses