October 1 (2014)

Don't Believe the Hype

Simple and well acted, it has tension enough to knot the stomach.

If the ambition is to provide two hours of instantly forgettable, popcorn-munching escapism, it succeeds.

It's entirely possible that sending the audience out feeling lousy was intentional

I liked this murder mystery from Nigeria. The film cinematography almost felt like a filmed play at times.....but that is just my observation.The plot was thick and readable part way in but far enough in to keep my interest.I really liked the setting, the clothing, and the characterizations. The best obviously, is the old inspector. This gave me a feel for what I hear is an up and coming Nigerian film scene.The mixture of culture and language was very interesting. Some English, mostly subtitles. Some British influence, mostly Nigerian.Cheesier parts like the murder scenes and investigation of murder scenes at really real locations sparked my interest.....I guess. On the whole, the nature of these just added to my interest in the film.

This was a very character rich film. Not a single scene was wasted. You feel taken by the hand invisibly by the storyteller and shown things that seem unimportant perhaps or out of context at the time, yet slowly but surely build towards powerful scenes and an inescapable conclusion. You don't have to know any Nigerian history to get a sense of the buzz in the air about the country's independence which was being launched at the time this provincial crime investigation takes place. It's also worth noting that the investigation does not rely on common tropes such as what a genius the investigator but rather on an organic navigation through unfamiliar territory and peculiar characters interacting in a fluid, at times comical at times dangerous framework.

When I was a kid in the early 60's, I'd come down to the breakfast table and find my stepfather reading about the Congo. For a little while, it was all over the news. I don't know if the Congo occupied the news in other metropolitan areas the way it did in Detroit. It really meant something there, probably because of Detroit's large black population.I remember as I glimpsed the blaring headlines and asked my stepfather what it all meant words like "independence." There was the name Patrice Lumumba and the seeming inevitability that he would be killed for his cause. The movie October 1 is set in Nigeria and does not mention Lumumba or necessarily take sides -- it is assumed everyone's for independence except possibly for the grudgingly accepting British empire forces who are still running things while planning to begin handing over power to a new Nigerian government, on Oct. 1, 1960. But the countrymen's anticipation of this ground-breaking transition is a still slightly uncertain backdrop to a detective trying to solve a string of murders and find his footing among his rulers.I started the movie expecting it to be interestingly amateurish as have been some movies I have seen from that part of the world ... peeks into a lifestyle that no matter how nascent are little different from anyone else's. Made in Africa by Africans, the movie seemed to have grass-roots production values but then I realized that was only because they reflected the milieu. In Nigeria in 1960 people still lived very close to the land. There would be a lot of foliage and open-air buildings to be seen. I loved the fabrics out of which women made cottony dresses featuring large emblematic portraits of their leaders.But as the movie progressed, I realized it did not suffer in production values at all; in fact, it was superior in some ways to anything I have seen coming out of the West lately. Perhaps the filmmakers did need to be creative for lack of a budget but I liked the way sometimes something, a sound, for instance, would get a special treatment, almost as if we could see the shock waves extending out on the screen. It has been a couple of months since I saw the movie and I have been wishing to write this review all that time so, please forgive me, I don't remember exactly the events being so depicted, they might have been a sound, or an emotion, or both. But I found the effects simple but evocative,I'm not going to go into the plot other than to say that some of its turns are surprising and adult and may not be suitable for children. But I think you'll like our detective, a man of dignity and sense and who is quite thin. Whoa. He is quite appealing. Winterbottom is dashing, too -- keep an eye out for Nick Rhys. But in Inspector Danny Waziri, Sadiq Daba nails the role of a lifetime. I have to add that I think Tunde Babalola's script was brilliant, understanding so well both sides of the transitiion and knowing when to crescendo. Even though the gaining of independence is not explained like a history lesson, it is an interesting snapshot of how the countrymen responded and an intriguing context for the movie's events and the detective's courage. October 1 is a great little movie. P.S. Maybe director Kunle Afolayan would like to make one of his future projects a biography of Lumumba, if it wouldn't be too controversial. From surveying a Wikipedia entry about Lumumba, he seems to have fit my cursory childhood take on him as a tragic leader.

Nigerian movies are renowned for poor story lines, bad acting, many errors, etc. But this one actually proves that the Nigerian movies industry can deliver great movies to the global audience.I thought I would sleep while watching or pause it at the quarter to watch the rest later. But the movie actually gripped me. October 1, paints a whole lot about Nigeria in the 1960s.The storyline was superb. Didn't know that Nigeria could actually have a serial killer story that can be compared with major Hollywood blockbusters but Kunle Afolayan did it.A must see, if you like thrillers and diversity.