Kala Lou
Well-Known Member
SYNOPSIS
In a town where blood thirsty Militants subject the government to coup d’état, life is unpredictable. It’s difficult to know when you will wake up to a brilliant morning sun which promises a day of solemnity, or a shimmering moon in which echoes the shouts of death. In the wake of the seemingly normalcy of a capricious life, a new regime is established in Kimbala town; the superlative Military regime of Yusuf Mumbasa! Thirstier and fiercer than his predecessors, the people of Kimbala are dumb by his extreme ruthlessness. The strongest of men are hit down to nothing more than a murmur; the influentials are coiled in their shells in total stillness and the civilians hide behind the hypocritical facet of patriotism! Who will dare stop Mumbasa?! Widows cry, orphans wail and the whole town mourns in complete silence…!!! In the time when a couple of determined souls uses a weapon that has no bullet or sharp edges to overcome Mumbasa and yet fail miserably, there arises a group of fearless combatants; a group of unstoppable young students who refuse to fall into the category of the coward! Their audacity is reinforced by their esteemed solidarity to seek justice for the family of their widowed vice principal, whose husband fell victim to the callous acts of Mumbasa. At this juncture, it cannot be told who is fiercer – the students or Mumbasa! But is that necessary, when all that matters is who wins at the end?! It is a war of fate, not only for the students, but that of Mumbasa as well….
Can these unarmed, inexperienced and relatively feeble minor students bring the well shielded wall of the fearsome tyrant down?! Time tells, but only the end of this story can give us the answer….
My Review (not gospel truth..just my opinion)
Pros:
Somewhere in Africa, production wise, is better than your average Nolly Flick, good sound quality, nice visuals…a number of outdoor scenery. The acting from the principal actors was good, especially Majid. The pacing of the movie was good too…it didn't drag along like most Nolly movies.
Cons:
The story could have been crafted better..there were questions that weren't answered at the end like how Franco(Majid) learnt a phrase that a minister used before he was assassinated…
Technically the production was mostly good except for a couple of scenes that had lighting issues. Director Frank Rajah Arase likes to shoot extreme closeups of the characters, this sometimes hurts the scene because the audience cannot visualize the space the characters are in. A number of times he jump cuts into another scene with the audience not knowing because he moves from one extreme closeup of someones face to another extreme closeup….he should consider reducing the closeup shots.
The movie doesn't really focus on one time period…with the male characters sporting afros I kinda figured it was the 70s at first but later saw characters using cell phones. The text at the end suggest the movie was based in the early 2000s but there is a scene in the movie where the teacher quotes Barak Obama??
The movie got a little preachy sometimes..
all in all I'll give it a 7/10
In a town where blood thirsty Militants subject the government to coup d’état, life is unpredictable. It’s difficult to know when you will wake up to a brilliant morning sun which promises a day of solemnity, or a shimmering moon in which echoes the shouts of death. In the wake of the seemingly normalcy of a capricious life, a new regime is established in Kimbala town; the superlative Military regime of Yusuf Mumbasa! Thirstier and fiercer than his predecessors, the people of Kimbala are dumb by his extreme ruthlessness. The strongest of men are hit down to nothing more than a murmur; the influentials are coiled in their shells in total stillness and the civilians hide behind the hypocritical facet of patriotism! Who will dare stop Mumbasa?! Widows cry, orphans wail and the whole town mourns in complete silence…!!! In the time when a couple of determined souls uses a weapon that has no bullet or sharp edges to overcome Mumbasa and yet fail miserably, there arises a group of fearless combatants; a group of unstoppable young students who refuse to fall into the category of the coward! Their audacity is reinforced by their esteemed solidarity to seek justice for the family of their widowed vice principal, whose husband fell victim to the callous acts of Mumbasa. At this juncture, it cannot be told who is fiercer – the students or Mumbasa! But is that necessary, when all that matters is who wins at the end?! It is a war of fate, not only for the students, but that of Mumbasa as well….
Can these unarmed, inexperienced and relatively feeble minor students bring the well shielded wall of the fearsome tyrant down?! Time tells, but only the end of this story can give us the answer….
My Review (not gospel truth..just my opinion)
Pros:
Somewhere in Africa, production wise, is better than your average Nolly Flick, good sound quality, nice visuals…a number of outdoor scenery. The acting from the principal actors was good, especially Majid. The pacing of the movie was good too…it didn't drag along like most Nolly movies.
Cons:
The story could have been crafted better..there were questions that weren't answered at the end like how Franco(Majid) learnt a phrase that a minister used before he was assassinated…
Technically the production was mostly good except for a couple of scenes that had lighting issues. Director Frank Rajah Arase likes to shoot extreme closeups of the characters, this sometimes hurts the scene because the audience cannot visualize the space the characters are in. A number of times he jump cuts into another scene with the audience not knowing because he moves from one extreme closeup of someones face to another extreme closeup….he should consider reducing the closeup shots.
The movie doesn't really focus on one time period…with the male characters sporting afros I kinda figured it was the 70s at first but later saw characters using cell phones. The text at the end suggest the movie was based in the early 2000s but there is a scene in the movie where the teacher quotes Barak Obama??
The movie got a little preachy sometimes..
all in all I'll give it a 7/10