A Trust In God Movies Presents Van Vicker (Joel), Browny Johnson (George), Ngozi Ezeonu (Edna), Pete Edoche (Sir Joe), Mercy Johnson (Ada). Director of Photography, Francis Ekure; Story/Screenplay, Ikenna Emma Aniekwe; Co-editors, Chinedu Mbara/Ugochukwu Elekwachi; Editor, Austin Faani Ikechukwu; Producer, Charles Offor; Director, Ikemma Emma Aniekwe. (c) 2010)
Walk In The Dark is about a mule-headed girl, Ada (Mercy Johnson) who brings shame to her fiancee George (Browny Johnson) and embarrassment to her father, Sir Joe (Pete Edoche) and mother Edna (Ngozi Ezeonu) when she gets pregnant by Joel (Van Vicker) out of wedlock. After all persuasions by her mother, for her to commit abortion, she refuses, and the fiancee steps out of the engagement and goes back abroad. Fortunately for Ada, the nominated father of her pregnancy, Joel accepts the pregnancy, and marries her and moves her out of her parents’ house to stay with him.
Ada’s pregnancy has complications enough in her fifth months that scares her mother and husband, Joel to opt for either abortion or cesarean surgery. On the other hand, Ada and her father, Sir Joe, it is neither of the two. Whereas on many occasions, Ada had run her father angry and he sustained twice slight heart attacks because of his weak heart, this time they are a team and express love for each other in every scene they interact. Complications get worse and even the doctor is afraid of Ada’s pulling through to the ninth month of delivery. Again, the family is split on the same issue of abortion or cesarean, but Ada and her father stand their ground. When Ada wakes one morning in a pool of blood, she’s forced to accept cesarean and has a premature baby.
Well, my secondary school literature teacher had a favorite saying about him: “What happens in the dark if it came to light, there’ll be no magistrate.” In essence, he’s saying that governors, judges, lawyers and all commit the same crimes in the dark, at night, that they try everyday people for, in the court. When George comes to know his fiancee, with whom he had never had sex and thinking she is a virgin, happens to get pregnant, the ignorance of it all angers him. He feels pity for his own ignorance, and to him, he has all this time been working in the dark, so much dark as Erebus, he suspects and accuses his innocent younger brother of cheating with his fiancee. I get the joke as a motif ‘The Dark Side’ written on the black T-shirt of Van Vicker in the scene at the hospital where they are waiting for the arrival of the doctor from the surgery room. If there’s any meaning to the words on the T-shirt about the story, I believe it only robs in the fact that all humans dread the dark side of life as we walk through. This movie is an allegorical essay on pro-life and abortion.
The theme of this little story set in the household of Sir Joe is not so little in content. It is an issue upon which most of the world, countries, political parties, religions and tribes and families are divided. Ada, asks her mother, “What would you want me to do mama, stay in your house with pregnancy out of wedlock?” Mother Edna wants her daughter to have an abortion. “You got to get rid of that baby like it or not.” Sir Joe says, “How dare you suggest abortion in my house? Abortion is a sin against God; abortion is a crime against humanity, abortion is a crime. She’ll have that child!” Reasons: Edna had lost her first daughter when she went to have a baby, and her oldest son committed suicide, and moreover she doesn’t want her daughter to miss the opportunity of marrying some fiancee from abroad. Sir Joe and his daughter Ada do not support abortion. Here, the household of Sir Joe divides over the question that the whole world is grappling with: to abort or not to abort: Pro-life versus Antilife.
Whereas the father takes side with pro-life for religious and moral reasoning, his wife stands for abortion or anti-life, so her daughter could have a better life in future if she marries George. Her logic is purely social and economic. I guess half the world today see it her way. The third group that comes into this equation is the justification of ‘questionable pregnancy’. It could have been rape. Here, Ada’s pregnancy becomes strongly doubtful when she develops complications bothering on death. Is abortion still not necessary at this point when Ada’s life is at stake? The doctor says he’s afraid for Ada to reach her ninth month and therefore suggests cesarean. The mother is seemingly vindicated. She presses further for abortion, only this time, she doesn’t want to lose her only child, and agrees to go with a cesarean. Ada and her father say they want a natural birth for the child and cross their fingers on Ada reaching the ninth month. In the end, even the father urgently demands his daughter has a cesarean when Ada wakes up in a pool of blood and is rushed into surgery, and has a premature baby.
Allegorical treatise of this nature is a difficult one to review because the audience is enraptured by the question the writer has put to us. We are more concerned with the story and its solution than the characters playing the parts. Each character has a symbolic meaning, and we try to pit for them and their beliefs instead of the acting. Even when the curtain goes down on this film, the audience will continue arguing and debating among them because naturally, every man or woman sees the world differently. The subplots are the George and his family storyline; Sir Joe and his family storyline, and Joel’s family storyline.
Just when George is ready to marry Ada, he finds out she’s pregnant, and to the joy of his step-mother, he drives Ada away from his home. George’s step-mother is vindicated because she had already called Ada a whore and prostitute, which George didn’t believe and got him angry at his step-mother. Joel, for whom Ada gets pregnant, though accepts the pregnancy, has a mother who doesn’t want to admit Ada. Sir Joe and his beloved daughter Ada are continually falling out and even at one point, causes Sir Joe to have a mild heart attack. These are circumstances that interestingly carry the story on, but they all take a back seat to the pregnancy theme.
Walk In The Dark, is not the first time Ikenna Emma Aniekwe addresses questionable pregnancy, abortion, and religion in her works. In the 2008 production, Act Of Faith deals with Pastor, Mercy Johnson, a fervent Christian who is raped by armed robbers and a week or two after, she finds out she’s pregnant. Pastor’s mother wants an abortion; her husband Leslie wants an abortion; Leslie’s mother Patience Ozorkwo wants an abortion, calling the unborn child as a, “condemned criminal.” Pastor, on the other hand, clutched to her bible won’t have an abortion. All actors and even the audience walk in the dark until Pastor has the baby which proves to be Leslie’s. Ada has faith, and that’s why she keeps the complicated pregnancy. Act Of Faith, laden with biblical verses could be appropriately called, Walking in The Dark, and Walking in the Dark, appropriately called Act Of Faith. I’m not starting any debate over these two titles, but they are just the way I see them. Both the stories are tear-jacking and make a believer out of the stubborn heart.