Put bluntly, the trailer for Being Annabel is bad. And the greatest travesty? The movie will be in cinemas next week, and I’m already sending my sympathies to those who might pay a premium to see it. Even if you are a Nollywood buff, you won’t be able to forgive the hot mess that the trailer is, a movie directed by Okey Zubele Okoh (Weeping Soul, Mirror of Beauty, Test of Kindness). I have dedicated a decent part of my life as a critic bemoaning bad movie trailers, but it seems we are going to be stuck in this rut for a long time because my message, obviously, keeps flying over the heads of these filmmakers.
Before I proceed, though, take a look at this mess of a poster.
The poster is so 2005 Nollywood, the kind plastered on pedestrian bridges and bus stops. It looks like the photo of each woman was taken separately and badly edited together through Photoshop. Also, how is it that I can see through the legs of Oma Nnadi? Like, THROUGH THE LEGS…IS SHE A GHOST? I’m already traumatised. The trailer, quite competently, unlocks a new world of horror. The choppy, lumpy quality of the lettering splashed at the opening of the trailer aside, a woman parks her car on a bridge and her suicidal plunge into the lagoon is aided with the most atrocious CGI I have ever seen.
This is the synopsis of the film: when a broke lady plays into the manipulation of her friend to impersonate her deceased twin sister so as to inherit her riches, she must be entangled in her sister’s love triangle along with the demons inside. The plot isn’t particularly original, but then it depends on how the movie is executed. The trailer, though, doesn’t inspire confidence as we see Alex Ekubo and Ken Erics fighting in a clumsy scene with abysmal fight sound effects.
Desmond Elliot is in this dumpster fire, and I really can’t string together what his date scene was about. Oma Nnadi is the titular Annabel, and I will just leave it at that. Out in cinemas on March 8, 2019, I’m shocked that a movie like Being Annabel will be shown in theaters when it can just be made available on streaming platforms like iROKOTv.
When Bernard Dayo isn’t writing about pop culture, he’s watching horror movies and reading comics and trying to pretend his addiction to Netflix isn’t a serious condition.
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