Royal Art Academy presents, Monalisa Chinde (Delphine), Joseph Benjamin (Iyke), Nse Ikpe Etim (Tena), Eka (Bhaira Mcwizu), Desmond Elliot (Bernard), Uche Jombo (Mimi), Bobby Michaels (David), Mathew H. Brown (Tunde). Director, Desmond Elliot; Producer, Emem Emong, Monalisa Chinde; Screenplay, Anthony Kahinde Joseph, Uduak Isong Oguamanam, Rita C. Onwurah. (C.2011)
“All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy,” they say. A minute into the film, Bernard (Desmond Elliot) and Iyke (Joseph Benjamin) are standing in each other’s face. They’re burnt out spending too much time wheeling and dealing their PR services and are making all the money in the world, but at the same time, they’re about to lose their sanities. They need a break. To this, I have a personal story to tell: I had a grocery store, and I was every employee into one. Day in day out I was at the store. My wife relieves me for a day, every second Saturday in a month. On such a day, when I am let go out of the store, I was like a deer left in broad daylight in the middle of a city square. I’ll be bright-eyed, confused, and hang out in places I had no business to be.
Iyke had to spend his off-time from the grueling office routine by hanging out at an uptown waterhole where affluent middle-class fellas meet and get acquainted with equally wealthy women. Sometimes spinsters, and most times those who had had too much wine last night wake up Saturday morning in strangers’ arms. They blame it on the goddess Bacchus; Some ladies at the waterhole, are not easy nuts to crack, they’ll yell at you to butt off of their faces. Iyke crosses a path with one of those who looks at you sideways from head to foot, suck their teeth at you before they high snap their fingers in the air and make an imaginary circle round their heads to ward off the evil luck.
The theme of Kiss and Tell is as old as God created Adam and Eve and story after that. The only differences since they (Adam and Eve) are the wittiness of the dialogue, comic and tragic sometimes, and rhetorical in large part. Stories about boy and girl who met and end at the church, getting married. About boy and girl, and the girl may run from the wedding alter, her gown floating in the air behind her; about both boy and girl who may decide to commit suicide because of love for each other (Kula Da Shi). In Kiss and Tell, the story ends when the two principal players, after playing cat and mouse with each other, in within ten days, kiss right at the door, tightly hugging each other while all friends present clap.
The first time Delphine Monalisa Chinde), a bright-eyed divorcee/spinster seemingly in constant shock by her look, and Iyke, an overly controlled aggressive fella, meet at the waterhole, we witness a rapid-fire exchange, as in ‘getting-to-know-you,’ from both characters. To hammer his masculine stance home to Delphine, we see Iyke stretching his kissing muscles, of course, we call them ‘lips,’ at the already spinster in shock. She heaved a sigh, grabs her drink off the counter and leaves the scene like a fish out of water. She’s thinking, “wow, what a fast-talking salesman.” Her gorgeous face and milky red-bone skin, however, leaves a spell on Iyke.
When Iyke and Bernard run into the same Delphine and her friend Tena during a lunch break, Iyke almost loses his mind at the sight of the bright-eyed divorcee. There’s a challenge and a wager between the two friends for Delphine. Iyke should lose his share in the partnership if he doesn’t lay Delphine in ten days, and Bernard should lose five-percent of his stock if Iyke does. Iyke hires Mimi (Uche Jombo) to do the underground background investigation on Delphine which she reluctantly does. Bernard privately sees Tena and tells her about Iyke’s mischievous plans to lay Delphine and even herself included. Having learned so, Tena forwarns Delphine about Iyke, and they both together with another friend, Eka (Bhaira Mcwizu), decide to play the game along with Iyke. Remember, Adam and Eve and the apple narrative in the bible? That’s where we are going with this story. Before ten days Iyke lays Delphine and Bernard loses the bet.
Kiss and Tell tells the most magnificent rhetorical tale I’ve reviewed since Guilty Pleasures (2009). It is a typical boy meets girl and fall in love story; girl plays hard to get, but later girl falls head over heels for the boy. What makes this one special is, a) there’s a financial stake involved; b) time constraint-ten days, c) the sidekicks-Tena, Eka, and Mimi.
Iyke is desperate to have Delphine for a lover, but Bernard thinks she’s beyond the reach of his business partner. To measure the size of his desperation, he’s easy to offer his share in the company if he loses on her. Bernard too must lose five-percent of his investment to Iyke if he wins Delphine’s love. Betting on a woman’s love must be boyish in every sense, yet the stake involved in the bet makes the story worth watching. Iyke damn well believes in himself and gets to work once he knows Delphine, through Mimi, who he pay-rolls. Bernard seeks help from Tena, a girlfriend of Delphine.
Another remarkable element of the film is the time constraint-ten days for Iyke to bring home the trophy. The writer here approaches the movie with a logical, rhetorical progression within the limited time. After the bet between Iyke and Bernard, and knowing full well the stakes involved, momentum sets in the narrative. Iyke asks for a conference with Delphine when he asks her to represent him in court against all women. The use of extended irony here put the film in a whole different gear and an exciting and dramatic element at that. Delphine rushes home to her friends Eka and Tena. Iyke is set up and invited home to Delphine for dinner. Another inside bet. At dinner with three of the ladies, Eka, Tena and Delphine, Iyke divulged a marathon sexual innuendos which evoked phallic desire in the ladies and gets them all, especially his target, drooling over him. After this point on, Iyke gets closer to shooting the bullseye with Delphine. To every experienced eye, she gets off the high horse.
There are two significant ways among many in making principal players come alive in a story. One is their history, which may occur in a flashback, or give them a sidekick. By completing the formula of this type of movie and in fact what makes it memorable are the sidekicks and their roles in shaping the story believable, and funny. Mimi and Iyke’s relationship to get to Delphine is funny. Her reluctance but easy acceptance when Iyke promises her a raise in salary, and the manner he drags her into the dispute between two friends. At a certain point, Bernard, at lunch tries to lobby Mimi to his side. Mimi couldn’t have it. “Betting on a woman? Bernard that’s beneath you, you are better than that. I’m not fixing anything. And I’m not eating because right now, am so upset!”
Tena and Eka are trying so hard to go with the ‘play along’ they set up with Delphine against Iyke. But surprisingly, Delphine falls naturally for Iyke after the salacious dinner scene without their knowing. You can sense traces of jealousy in her changed demeanor as Tena and Eka are all over Iyke. Then comes the actual fall out between them when Iyke and Delphine for the first time, are ready to smoosh and to put things in the bag, you know what I mean, and Tena comes bursting out of the closet. Delphine is embarrassed and disparaged, while Tena is disappointed, crestfallen, and stands askance in disbelief.
Kiss and Tell is a simple love theme but beautifully presented. I enjoyed Joseph Benjamin’s acting here opposite Nse Ikpe Etim more than I did in Mr. and Mrs. Boy, Etim’s makeup artist in that film brings her close to Whoopie Goldberg’s timid character in Color Purple. There, in Mr and Mrs, Joseph Benjamin comes full circle from being a wife abuser to wife worshipper. Here, he must have seen dozens of Cary Grant’s movies before walking on the set of Kiss and Tell. Every bit of his acting and happy and funny demeanor must have been ripped off of Cary Grant’s playbook. Cary Grant-like height too.
Three scenes: pre-dinner, dinner, and after-dinner form the climax of the movie. The dialogue in those three scenes keeps me grinning from ear to ear without ever noticing. Here’s Iyke on sex:
Iyke, “What I want from them (women) is sex. Sex uninhibited, wild, aggressive, purely animal.”
At this point, Tena’s fork is stuck in her mouth dreamily looking at Iyke’s lips, as she sits lost in a sexual fantasy of her own.
Delphine stymied, softly, “What do you want me to say. I’m pulling out of the deal.”
Iyke, “it’s not fair.”
Delphine outraged, “You’re not gonna have any, ever!”
Iyke nonchalantly, ” I never said anything about any. I said I want some.”
Delphine, berates, (Overlap), “You’re not getting any, not even some!”
Iyke, “…I’m the devil you know…because every man that ever walks up to you wants the same thing, sex.”
Delphine is done in entirely after Iyke lays out his card bluntly on the table. Coupled with the sexually graphic narrative of Iyke, she sees honesty in this suitor.
When an actor has stacked up over three hundred films spanning from 2002 to date under his belt and produced four films, one wonders how his daily life looks like, with all the script lines committed to memory, the form and posture he attains for a particular movie but still maintains a fresh and young look. Directing one, in fact, ten comes naturally to him. Kiss and Tell is a testament to the seriousness of Desmond Elliot towards the career of filmmaking. My grandmother used to say: “All play and no work makes Jack an idiot.”