In the 2021 biopic Ayinla, the first time Lateef Adedimeji meets Omowunmi Dada, his legs involuntarily lift off the floor and he pauses his singing because this regal beauty has taken up space and commanded everyone’s attention. Even in Biyi Bandele’s 2022 adaptation of Soyinka’s play, Elesin Oba: The King’s Horseman, Odunlade Adekola spots a beautiful Omowunmi Dada during a dance and vows to make her his bride there and then. These simple but sincere moments played vital roles in getting the two men into serious trouble, and I perfectly understand them because she moved me in the same way. In Christopher Marlowe’s words, she can be likened to Helen of Troy, whose face launched a thousand ships and was credited with starting the Trojan War.
On the above notes, you should understand my disappointment seeing subsequent films that feature the actress in middling romantic plots. Frustratingly, these films toe the line of overdone and tired tropes, where her partners do not go wild with their adoration. Still recovering from the dispassionate performance from Dada’s supposed fiance in the 2023 December release Ada Omo Daddy, in Meeting Funmi’s Parents we are faced with another similar type. Just that this time, he is a blue-eyed American playing the same character Nollywood writers have come to love writing: an ill-prepared prospective oyinbo spouse coming to the home of a very “cultured” Nigerian family to seek their daughter’s hand in marriage. You know how it goes. Hint: it goes boring. Just like her love interest in Ada Omo Daddy, he proposes to her casually in a restaurant and is quite laid back about it. For a greater part of the film, they try to portray a perfect couple but it doesn’t work because Dada appears more eager than her on-screen partner. The foreigner, played by Roman Thomson, lacks the gusto needed to sell the romance, and this affects the chemistry between our interracial couple.
In Meeting Funmi’s Parents, the -com in romcom is left in the hands of acts whom the director (Kevin Apaa, known for Dinner At My Place) imagines are experienced actors. This decision poses a threat to the film. Mr. Alabi (Akin Lewis) is supposed to provide major comic relief, but his outbursts come off as uncivil, and unfortunately cannot elicit the saving grace of laughter. He is offensive, and his behaviour is incongruent with the tenets of the culture he says Jason, his daughter’s fiancé, lacks.
Another person at the scene of the comedic crime is internet personality Brodda Shaggi, who plays Paulinus. Just like his character in the 2020 “romcom”, Namaste Wahala, he is a loudmouth driver, transporting the couple, Funmi (Omowumi Dada) and Jason (Thomson) from the airport to the house. That ride is inundated with every stereotype you can think of. Like the idea that she is with him for the green card and that Paulinus is so silly that he cannot tell that Jason is lying about being Jason Statham’s brother.
The film is not all bleak, as a few standout characters save it. Professional Nollywood loverboy, Timini Egbuson, plays Ayo, the “Yoruba demon” ex of Funmi, whom her father favours more than the American. Ayo, who claims to be repentant, is persistent in his desire for Funmi. He wants her back and he is serious about it. Even if we did not meet him when he was a cheating boyfriend, we can attest to growth on his part. Only with his impassioned declarations do we see the Omowunmi Dada we have come to know and love. It is demonstrated yet again, that to accomplish great chemistry in the portrayal of romance, the man has to be a real yearner. Films like Fred Amata’s Letters to a Stranger and Desmond Elliot’s Bursting Out serve as proof. Even Egbuson’s act in Biodun Stephen’s 2023 Big Love attests to this.
Veteran actor Madam Taiwo Ajai-Lycett plays the Grandma. She dotes on Funmi, and gives us eloquent touching monologues about her past and her wishes for the future of her granddaughter. During a birthday celebration purported to be her last because of a deadly cancer, she makes a final wish that moves Funmi and the audience to tears. The two stars offer honest performances that make the experience somewhat bearable.
The stake at hand is the battle for Funmi’s heart, between ex-boyfriend Ayo and fiancé, Jason. Because of the unreasonable reaction to Jason when he first arrives, you almost do not take Funmi’s parents seriously. At first, we think that Jason’s only flaw is that he cannot pronounce gbegiri correctly, or that he doesn’t know to say something other than “Hi Mr./Mrs. Alabi” to his Nigerian partner’s parents when they meet for the first time, but down the line it is revealed that he is not the blue-eyed angel thrown into this cross-cultural clash. Ayo, who comes later, demonstrates enough love to conquer Jason’s unforgivable flaws.
Unfortunately, Meeting Funmi’s Parents is another tired attempt at this overdone trope. It is expected that by now, foreign, or American spouses, in this case, would have learnt the basics of the accepted culture they intend to marry into. Here in Meeting Funmi’s Parents, we encounter the same cultural conflicts again, and they aren’t even dealt with with nuance or subtlety. The romance is questionable and the comedy is not funny. Even though it fails to make a strong impression suitable for the Valentine’s season, it is not as disastrous as the 2020 Nigerian-Indian attempt.
Meeting Funmi’s Parents premiered on January 26, 2024, in cinemas.
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Side Musings
- Message to Jason and/or writers: there will never be another Kevin from Isoken. Give it up.
- The one thing I loved hearing from Mr. Alabi was something about the influence of American cultural imperialism. Like Soyinka, I am vehemently against it!
- Emmanuel Ikubese seems out of place. He mopes and speaks like he’s in a music video where he cannot be heard.
- What an ugly ring Jason proposed with! It cannot compare with Ayo’s improvised car key ring.
- Incongruence. Father jumps out of bed because he hears strange sounds, but walks into a room of soundly sleeping people. Curious.
- Leave internet personalities out of films if they are coming to play the silly characters they do in their skits, please.
- In the film’s opening scene, there is Nigerian Funmi, white American Jason and an Asian woman in the background. A culturally diverse scene!
- More Timini as lover boy, please.
- The Funmi soundtrack…how can we get it?
