The uncanny has long had a home in the Nigerian imagination. But its contemporary cinematic form is indebted to western sci-fi. Since Akay Mason’s Day of Destiny, which was promoted as Nigeria’s first time-travelling film, Nollywood has released at least three more films exploring time manipulation. The latest is Dele Doherty’s Landline.
In Landline, a soldier (Gabriel Afolayan) sequestered in a safe house must guide his wife (Zainab Balogun) through surviving a deadly home invasion, via telephone. The twist: they are in a time loop: every failure resets the day. Doherty understands that the loop is never just about time. In Groundhog Day, perhaps the ur-text of the theme, the point is a man evolving beyond his childish selfishness. Inception is about a man trapped in guilt.
In Landline, a man must come to terms with his helplessness in the face of maternity’s dangers. But worthy theme notwithstanding, the heart of cinema is a good story. Everything else is dressing. It remains Nollywood’s curse that few films emerge from its oven without glaring defects.
The time-loop curse
Before Landline, Zainab Balogun starred in The Beads, another time-loop thriller. There too, she is murdered repeatedly on her wedding day, within a loop supposedly meant to resolve her struggle with addiction. But the logic falls apart: how is her father’s culpability in someone else’s death a flaw she must overcome before marrying, and why does she need her grandmother’s guidance to do so? If the father never repents his tyranny, does the film suggest that women must shoulder moral accountability for the failings of others; failings they weren’t even privy to?
This problem of messaging recurs in Isioma Osaje’s Japa!, where characters hoping to flee economic and systemic hardship are trapped in a time loop that ultimately forces them to stay and fix the country. As noble as the message sounds, the film leans toward victim-blaming, underestimates the force of systemic oppression, and, upon release, eerily echoed the government’s own authoritarian efforts to prevent citizens from emigrating.
To its credit, Landline at least centers a coherent and meaningful theme. Yet as soon as the plotting begins, one finds oneself chuckling in disbelief. In what plausible world is a high-value individual taken into protective custody without his loved ones, despite their obvious vulnerability? Surely, the idea that a wife could serve as a pressure point in extracting secrets should be obvious.
Then comes the [spoiler alert] twist: the soldier’s isolation is a ruse to separate him from his wife, who is the real target of an assassination plan. As a parable, the implication, that some pursuits are meaningless beside love and duty, is resonant. As a plot point within the film’s own reality, however, it’s absurd. The strategy wastes time, manpower, and resources. There are countless simpler ways to eliminate a pregnant woman. Must we believe that separating her from her husband who knows nothing is the most effective?
You begin to wonder: is the time loop the least remarkable thing about this film?
Nollywood’s recurring trouble
Once again, we arrive at the all-too-familiar refrain: Nollywood has a storytelling crisis. The industry is plagued by poor storytellers. In plotting, in theme, in world-building, one finds incongruities so glaring they’re almost painful.
Why do we hear similar-sounding voices on the phone offering aid to the protagonist, distinguishable only by device or a scan of the end credits after repeat viewings? Is it poor writing, poor casting, or both? Why does Zainab Balogun in two different movies fail to take even the most basic security precautions, despite her life being under direct threat? That alone could be a plot for another thriller.
In The Beads, she has the option of alerting security to a killer with easily identifiable clothing, yet instead dances on the liminal beach between life and death with bare-chested men. In Landline, she stands with her back to a wooden door squarely in the line of fire, or emerges from cover to have a teary two-hour conversation in the open. And must we mention the ending, where she forgets her gun entirely and opts instead for a baseball bat, buoyed by the imagined power of a calming cup of tea?
Here’s a proposal: Nollywood needs a Stupid Scale. Before shooting begins, every director, screenwriter, or hyphenate must subject their script to a system that tests the integrity of its plot, characters, themes, and internal logic. If any component fails, I propose a simple intervention: a sharp smack on the head and a scream in the ear: Stupid!
With today’s advances in AI, such a system is likely within reach. Short of that, we need an informal but rigorous system of checks ready for the next time someone catches a “bright” idea for a high-concept film.
