A Trip To Abuja
A Louis Merchandise Ltd. Presents, Genevieve Nnaji (sharon), Enebeli Elebuwa (senator Agodi), Oby Edozie (paula), Nneka Onyekwuluje (lady B), Rich Azu (Alhaji dan Kebbi), Tony Omole (reuben ofili), Prince Val Nwigwe (collins), Emeka Okoro (ralph), Akim Rahman (boss), Austin Mbanifo (Colonel Onega). Screenplay/Director, Adim Williams; D.O.P, Ngozi Nkebakwu; Editor, Iyke Okafor Nwoko; Executive Producer/Producer, Louis Isikaku. (C 2003)
A reviewer once said in a piece that, to understand any issue of an author’s work you’re reviewing, go on the hunt for another work, of any kind by the same author. There’re always traces of that artist’s handiwork locked somewhere in his past projects. So, I have to go on the research, and I found, Queen Of Asso Rock among many of Adim Williams’ directorial projects. Queen of Asso Rock is a graduated form of the 2003 A Trip To Abuja. The Writer and Director, you bet, were testing their prowess in exploiting the political atmosphere of Abuja, in A Trip To Abuja. The two notable Nollywood darlings, Omotala Jalade and Genevieve Nnaji, are always present in Adim’s Abuja projects. Nothing wrong with that. Those two ladies have class. Abuja too has class.
In Queen Of Asso Rock, Maryam single-handedly brings the weak-minded male Abuja politicians to their knees, by blackmailing all of them kingmakers, with numerous skeletons in their closets. She takes their places and becomes the vice president maker, only that she comes short of being the vice president’s wife. Her over zealousness and insatiable desire for wants and wants, and unending wants, cause her destruction. One thing she forgets in the entire process of her intrigue to garner the Abuja society on her side is that she is transient. Man is transient. There’s a saying that, in every city, people come and go, but town hall will always be there. Maryam, at last, subdues herself in the face of an attempted murder of the vice president’s wife.
Sharon (Genevieve Nnaji) is the first to take a swipe at the city, in 2003, A Trip To Abuja. Her long-time friend, Paula (Oby Edozie) welcomes her and hooks her up with Lady B (Nneka Onyekwuluje) who can cut deals, parcels her deals and delivers her deals to all the rich Alhaji’s, diplomats, Ministers and Board Of Directors in Abuja for N20,000, per night. Sharon couldn’t go for handouts. Her dreams of making it big in Abuja is well beyond the powers and influences of Lady B. She doesn’t think Lady B is the bedrock of her success in Abuja and therefore has to start by hanging out with Honorable Reuben Ofili, Minister of States, a man of polish and panache.
Once introduced to Lady B, Sharon has gotten her license to traverse the rough landscape of Abuja, rife with corruption, bribery, womanizing and intrigue, and she uses those elements to thrive. Now, this is Abuja. The Asso Rock of the Nigerian establishment. The Mecca, where well-meaning and ambitious men and women hold pilgrimage. You should look at her face when Lady B tells her not to dress in her African, Nigerian costume. From thence on, and in all scenes Sharon dresses in the most terrific and most beautiful African clothes as a defiance to Lady B. Is that the second fall out with her hostess? She abandoned the guest of a scare-crow introduced to her at the first Abuja party. She’s not the type to sell to a haggard-looking old man for a pittance, so she bolted out of his company, and soon the old crow passes out in slumber. That is her first fall out with Lady B. She has a mission to take Abuja by the balls.
Since she traveled all the way to Abuja to take on the 13,000 ft long monolith called Asso Rock, called Abuja, she needed nobody like Lady B. All she had was her wits. Soon, the young and hot beau in town got the city doyens running after her. She played them like a football and got them spending time and money on her little self. She starts with the Minister of States.and in a bizarre twist of events; she won him over by saving him from scammers who were to rip him off of N20 millions. As if the relationship with the minister is wetting her fit in the Abuja waters, she hops from one tycoon to another until word about the “over sabi girl,” as one errant suitor put it blankly, floats in the tight Abuja community.
In one notable scene, Sharon gets Alhaji dan Kebbe ( Rich Azu), and Senator Agode (Enebeli Elebuwa), wiggle fingers in each other’s faces. They spit in each other’s faces, throw cuss words at each other. They challenge one another to a dwell, and at last warn one another to lay off Sharon, while she stands at the edge of the arena and watches the two grown-ups act like kids. In the end, she dumps them both. Then, then, Sharon’s nemesis, Colonel Onega (Austin Mbanifo) runs amok into her. He’ll be damned if he doesn’t have a piece of what Sharon has been sharing with other men in the community. She barely escapes a gun-pointed-at-her-scene, but for a strange character named Collins (Prince Val Nwigwe) who intercepts Colonel Onega from getting away with Sharon. Begrudged as he leaves the scene, Colonel Onega promises revenge and payback on Sharon.
Sharon gets too big for her breeches in the Abuja society and along the way creates many enemies. Lady B. for one. Just as the late vice president’s wife will go to bat to join other conspirators to see Maryan down in Queen of Asso Rock, so is Colonel Onega and Lady B in A Trip To Abuja. Sharon quickly falls for the shady deal brought to her by Collins, and as it turns out, she heads for her downfall and total disgrace. She inadvertently becomes an international courier of drugs and gets hooked on the quick-rich, delicious phenomenon. She falls in Collins’ hands, and with her denial to snitch on the cartel, she goes to jail.
Watching this movie and the lead character Sharon, I find Genevieve to have come 360 degrees in her acting. Genevieve has made the camera part of her repertoire. She acts in the ordinary like there’s no mechanical eye gnawing at her. I remember when I reviewed one of her early movies, Caught In The Act, a film where Genevieve plays two lives as a reputable married wife, on one side of town, and a call-girl on the other end of the city. She’s right in it but not as excellent as I find her in the latter movies especially so in A Trip To Abuja. She has matured a lot.
The use of the rock in A Trip To Abuja acts as a motif and symbol of impregnation. A tall order. A formidable challenge. In both Queen Of Asso Rock, and the earlier, A Trip To Abuja, Adim Williams’ lead characters, Maryam (Omotala Jalade) and Sharon (Genevieve Nnaji) set out to conquer the impregnable male world of Abuja, come off short. Sharon takes her best shot, but wanted it all in one blast and therefore forfeits all. Both stories seem like the attack of womanhood on the Abuja nuevo-rich, drunk with power, money, and influence. But one thing though, Asso Rock is a giant rock that spiritually guards the city of Abuja. It must be a male spirit and therefore doesn’t take lightly to women. I am not surprised why both the futures of Queen Of Asso Rock and Sharon STONE in A Trip To Abuja, founder on the Asso Rock.