With screenplay by Doris Ariole, directed by Valentine Edochie, produced by Uchenna Mbunabo and Executively produced by Tana Adelana (also starring as Gladys), this movie titled “Tender Hedges” is now streaming on the latter’s YouTube channel with same name.

Synopsis: (MAY include spoilers) 

Gladys (Tana Adelana) on the one hand is a dedicated class teacher in a community. She’s loved by her students. But in her closet, she drowns in misery.

Akunne (Angel Unigwe) on the other hand is a student in the school. She lives with her grandmother who is perpetually unhappy due to constant flooding memories of an ugly incident in the past.

Dozie (Wole Ojo) comes to the community in search of his relative and would cross paths with both Gladys and Akunne.

What sad occurrence happened in the past? How does this affect all parties involved? Who is Dozie’s relative and how does this concern the others? Well, why not grab your popcorn and/or favourite drink, munch and sip along as you follow events unfold in this drama with a runtime of 2hours 21minutes 21seconds.

My Take:
This movie gave me a Nollywood of old feel which I love so much. The actors here were natural in their delivery and nothing seemed forced. I’ve always admired Tana’s calm demeanour in movies. Angel equally brought on her A-game! Sharon Ifedi (as Oluchi) also came through. I can’t believe how tall and grown she is now.

Location & setting too were realistic and relaxing. Something about these kinds of ambience that just does it for me! Maybe I just love me some natural rural dwellings with green raw vegetations & unprocessed foods as opposed to the urban city hustling and bustling lifestyle with lots of polluted air and insecurity.

While the story here is outstanding, I find that the plot lacked depth and the direction made the entire outcome very predictable, in my opinion.

The duration which should have consisted of most of the back stories only saw a dragging on of repeated dialogues and sequencing which then culminated in a bore for a viewer like myself. But hey, x1.25 playback speed to the rescue albeit this still made the movie seem slow-paced.

The entire outlook of the film is a breath of fresh air to be honest. I just wished they had focused more on what made up or led to the story rather than the attention paid to the back and forths of the father & daughter. Well, it tallies with the title though.

Although lighting was a bit dodgy in some scenes, picture quality and sound were however good overall. Nevertheless, I can’t help but think about these:

OBSERVATION/QUESTIONS:
1. We know the Barrister lived abroad. What really transpired between him and Akunne’s mother? I was hoping to see a flashback or more talks on that. Or did I miss it when I blinked? 

 I mean there was sufficient time for all that, right? 

2. For a Barrister who had that much wealth, based on his standard of living, Dozie seemed to have much time to spare, moving from the city to stay in a community for more than a week all in an attempt to change a teenager’s mind. Hmmmm…that seemed unrealistic. Well, I guess he was on holidays. But this was not established. Or was it? 

3. From the moment Dozie appeared in the community and his girlfriend was portrayed as an angry, mean, nagging, self centred, narcissistic woman, I pretty much summed up the rest of the movie.

4. The intrigue or suspense build up from the start of the movie wasn’t sustained as there appeared to have been a weakened plot somewhere along the line.

5. What really happened between father and daughter when they went to the farm? One minute Dozie is bragging about coming back with 7 heads of snakes, the next he’s hospitalised for snake bite and the next, Akunne is to blame and she’s screaming “I didn’t know there would be snakes there!” Ah! That didn’t add up. Something was missing! Or did I miss something? 

6. The approach used here seemed more like one borne out of convenience. It wasn’t clear why Dozie’s girlfriend acted the way she did and worst still how she ended things. Who does that! Please don’t get me wrong. I wasn’t expecting the usual girlfriend fighting over her man type of thing. But c’omon, we needed clarity here! The build up to her decision wasn’t sufficient.

Conclusively, this is a good watch but could have been way better had they tried much to tighten loose ends, give more depth to the story or opted for a shorter duration.

It was refreshing to see veteran actress Rita Edochie here. That gave me the much needed vibes even though her role was shortlived. I also loved seeing legendary Emma Anyalogu in his element.

His role as Mazi Ogbonna brought a bit of comic relief to the movie however subtle and brief his character may have been. And I honestly wanted to see his two wives and ELEVEN children in his room and parlour accommodation.