Nollywood Movie ‘ The Set-Up’ LGBTQ Undertones, Crazy Plot and A Show

‘What is this place?’ ‘A private members club’
‘Motunrayo Elesho, I want to marry her’
‘We had a plan’ ‘I changed the plan’

I finally got to watch the much talked about Nollywood movie ‘The Set-Up’ and it has me feeling elated at how far we have come in creating globally appealing content.

The movie is a work of art from Nollywood, I think it was primarily designed to be for thinkers and cerebral folks.

However, after watching it, I noticed people who seemed confused the entire time coming out of the cinema and joining in singing praises, clearly no one wants to appear dim-witted. Though pretending to understand a movie when you don’t is a little phoney, I am happy that this movie is awakening a consciousness in people to celebrate work that attempts to showcase intelligence or at least a semblance of it.

Here are some of the highs and lows of ‘The Set-Up’ for me.

What I Loved About The Set-Up

The Cast
I adored the entire cast, especially Grace (Kehinde Bankole) in the movie, the girl-next-door charm and vulnerability were believable. Besides, her on-screen chemistry with Adesua Etomi is beautiful to watch.
Dakore Egbuson also did amaze, her fit body, by the way, is goals. At some point, I was convinced she was the star of the show. She didn’t disappoint and undoubtedly helped in no small way to thicken the ridiculous ‘plan’.
Adesua Etomi looked stunning in every scene. Her love for her craft shining brightly.
Joke Silva was rightfully the doyen and matriarchal in yet another Nollywood movie, it was predictable, her gracefulness and aura would have been more refreshing but for the fact that she was typecasted yet again (Oops I am supposed to be talking about what I Ioved)

Cinematography, Sound, Music
Cinematography and lighting were impressive. The sound was equally perfect. I also considered the transition music enthralling.

Over here are some of the highs and lows for me.

LGBTQ Undertones
Two scenes hinted at physical attraction and love between Chike (Adesua Etomi) and Agent Spencer. This is rare in Nollywood to show same-sex relationships in a non-critical way and the way they snuck it in at the end is LOUD!

What I’m a Little Confused About

The Story

The story is unpredictable, justifiably action parked but if you are not careful you may get puzzled in all the plot twists and wildly far-fetched story. Several times in the cinema I overheard people interpreting the plot to their friends who got lost and required guidance to sustain interest, the interpreter sometimes succeeding in creating more confusion and distracting others.

What I Didn’t Love

Too Many Plot Twists
My head was spinning at some point. It was like glimpsing something fascinating from outside and not being able allowed in as if only the actors comprehended what was going on, i think they meant to create suspense and a deep story but failed at the suspense part, creating perplexity instead.

Should Be a Drama Series?

I genuinely feel 1 hour 40 minutes wasn’t enough, most of the characters like Madame (Tina Mba) had layers that would take a longer show to unravel and the floral dresses she was draped in, in every scene didn’t help much. Edem (Jim Iyke) seemed like a character created purely to confuse us all, we needed more time with him too.

Chike and Grace
I didn't know if it is precisely about them or the Eleshos. I do admire how seriously Adesua Etomi took her job. It reflected in every single scene, what I didn’t love was the fact that in the end the character came across to me as a contraption of the filmmakers ambitiousness, creating moments that were meant to impress and provide shock-value, even though it confounded the audience and took a little away from what we came to watch. Her delivery is Oscar-worthy, and it is contrived to be just that, even if it harmed the story in the process.

Green Eyes
Why did they come up with the green-eyed baby picture? Confusing and genuinely upsetting, a green-eyed child is not a tiny detail, they should have bothered to invariably make the ambitious mother (Madame) green-eyed too.

Unconvincing Revenge Motive
The plot to destroy the Eleshos, the two-plot-no-plot revenge mission.

The plan and no plan. Everything created to not help us suspend reality because we just couldn’t get in, it was amusing, but not in a good way.

In all, I must admit it was not a bad movie. Would I watch it again? Yea, I need to confirm I didn't just watch a crazy show-off.