Penance tells the story of the CEO of a company, Mr Majekodunmi, who has been accused of rape by a youth corps member serving in his organisation.
The movie stars Wale Ojo, Nonso Bassey, Gregory Ojefua and Uzoamaka Onuoha and was directed by Awal Abdulfatai.
Penance is a slow-paced movie, the type you can watch in the living room, and you still have time to head to the kitchen to do your cooking without missing much by the time you get back.
It, however, delivers good acting, which came from Wale Ojo, while Gregory Ojefua was good but sometimes exaggerated his role as a detective investigating the rape allegation against Majekodunmi. I wonder why the directors decided to make him appear too clumsy and intelligent at the same time. The other actors delivered mid-performance.
If I had seen this movie at the cinema, I would have left midway or snoozed off in between because I found it boring. The soundtrack was too mellow and almost non-existent. The movie lacks the spark to make it to the cinema, which explains why it was placed on a streaming platform that is fast becoming a dumping ground for poor Nollywood content.
I think the producers deliberately used Wale Ojo, knowing fully well that his face would draw attention to the movie. I must say it worked because his face on the poster made me see the movie, but I was disappointed. I think the industry needs to understand that there are too many movies out there and people’s attention span is dwindling. So any movie that doesn’t hold water will be ignored by potential viewers.
We’ve seen so many movies centred on rape and rape allegations. I don’t think Nollywood should be adding to the pool. I guess every time Nollywood tries to veer off its forte of drama and comedy, it does a horrible job.
Penance is not visually stunning. It’s like the colorists just slammed a Kodak 2383 LUT on the movie and called it a day. The LUT made the movie look good in the indoor scenes but poor outdoors. The lack of the use of depth of field strips the movie of the chance to look cinematic. Everything was just in focus, especially in the outdoor scenes, leading to distractions. The office lighting was great. I think an Orange and Teal color grade would have worked better because of the white walls of the office.
There’s nothing to say about costumes other than that the characters wore corporate attires because most of the scenes were set in the office.
I can’t recommend Penance to anyone except those who don’t mind consuming any content that comes their way. I rate the movie 4/10.
