Stunning black and white cinematography accentuates this mystical and dreamy drama from Nigeria. 

It’s a film about the struggle between mystic beliefs and modern science. But it’s not a condemnation of either but rather a condemnation of the people who use either philosophy to gain power and to abuse it. 

It’s also a film about the inherent differences between a matriarchy and a patriarchy. The same complaints seems to apply to both but one is visibly more sadistic and cruel. 

The film is undeniably gorgeous. It’s quite brisk in its pace too so we get sucked in and are constantly hooked with following the journey. It’s not a film of big moments. It rather chooses to shoot everything in as serene a manner as possible and uses lots of Lynchian overlays to show multiple scenes at once without grounding them so we can float through the mysticism that underlies the entire picture. 

When violence erupts its upsetting and tense because we become very sympathetic to the cast and the betrayal carries a shocking weight that is never explained so we just have to sit with this turn of events and it’s upsetting. 

There is one moment in the film where color is introduced and it’s stunning. The right moment in the right manner. The whole ending of the film is this beautiful finality that, while never making a definitive statement or judgement, allows for multiple possibilities to exist in our world. I like that. 

It’s subtitled “A West Afrikan Folklore” and that sums the whole thing up. I appreciate the film immensely as an American who doesn’t get much authentic exposure to African cultures. It’s a beautiful and loving film dealing with real struggles and questions. I love the dreamy aesthetic and mythical atmosphere. Really great flick and I want to see the other films by this director. One of his shorts and an anthology film he contributed to are on Prime but the rest looks MIA via legal and convenient means. Hopefully that’ll change. But between this and the just released on Mubi (and shipping on BD in a couple weeks from Utopia) Omen I hope to see more African cinema in the future.