By Ali Baylay
Production: Busy Brain Entertainment; Cast: Jim Iyke, Omotola Jolade, Emeka Enyiocha; Director: Livinus Nwabueze; Executive Producer: Livinus Nwabueze; 1.15 mins.
The plot of gangster movies come straight from the day to day happenings in the society as brought to us in our newspapers and evening news headlines, and this is a subject that interests not only film makers but even the general public. In the US, gangster movies thrived in the era of the Great Depression, when jobs were scarce and families could not find work, lest make a decent living. Crime became rampart and the caricature of these criminals on the silver screen was entertaining to the general moviegoers. Characters in Little Caesar (1930), Public Enemy (1931), Bonnie and Clyde (1967), and not so recent movies like Natural Born Killers and Thelma and Louis, both in early 90s were people we can identify with as our neighbors and therefore be entertained by them in our living rooms. Since gangster movies do not warrant much crowd and other expenses, at this time in US film history, about six studios produced nearly 300 gangster films. With rampart crime in Nigeria due to lack of work or sources of decent livelihood, Nollywood must be presenting its case in Left Alone.
Some characteristics of a gangster movie include, iconic use of guns; tragic resolutions where the main characters have a shoot out; one of the two gangster lovers (there’s always a broad in gangster movies) gets shot and dies in the other’s arm, in some alley (Jim Iyke and Omotala Jolade in Left Alone); in car wrecks pushed over cliffs; both gangster lovers are shot together and die together while holding hands. All in all, gangsters’ lives in crime fiction always crumble, especially to signify that crime won’t pay. A classic gangster movie has to have a larger than life performer to carry it through and through, as Jim Iyke in Left Alone.
You never want to miss the beginning of a gangster movie if you’re reviewing it. Most stories are told in the first five minutes of screen time. In the case of Left Alone, if you missed the opening sequence, all you have left is lots of gun plays; some one is in control of a mysterious briefcase and heaven knows what’s in it. Another person chases the other in some alley. The briefcase shows up again after more guns fired and bloodshed. Then a little scamper in an alley; wow!, someone gets arrested; no!, she escapes from the hospital and another chase begins. Amidst this all there’s not an intelligible dialogue from any body except Kelvin, “you killed my mother, am gonna shoot you between your balls!”
Left Alone is a story of a heist gone soar between three criminals, Kelvin (Jim Iyke), Cassandra (Omotala Jolade) and Briggs (Emeka Enyiocha) over the sharing of loot. At the beginning of the movie, Briggs in an old model Mercedes runs into Kelvin, helping his disabled mother out of an alley while Cassandra, clutching to a briefcase tows behind. Shock wave goes through Briggs and goes for his gun, ramming shots into Kelvin’s mother and kills her. Police arrives on the scene and Cassandra gets arrested and is forced to confess, but makes her way out by faking sick and runs from the hospital. Main while, Kelvin goes under and joins pastoral service for a church, while Briggs creeps in alleys looking for both Kelvin and Cassandra.
One thing with caper films, there’s no winner and in the end the characters are always trapped with no way out. Some brave ones even end up taking their own lives. In the finale of Left Alone, Cassandra goes back to retrieve the briefcase, both Kelvin and Briggs meet with her in this backyard alley, Kelvin with few exchanges with Briggs shoots Briggs and he falls. While Kelvin and Cassandra are locked in kiss, thinking they’re in the clear, Briggs comes back to and shoots Cassandra in the back. Of the three criminals only Kelvin is left alone, in Left Alone.