King of Thieves (Ogundabede): The Brilliant Storytelling With Its Flaws

Nollywood has improved with filmmaking. The storytelling, the production, the casts, and more keep solidifying why Nollywood is one of the best movie industries in the world. The latest Femi Adebayo Salami movie, ‘King of Thieves (Ogundabede) is one of the movies that reinforce that fact.

Since the release of ‘King of Thieves (Ogundabede) on 4, April, 2022 across cinemas all over the country, the film has been doing some amazing numbers, both with the increase in the numbers of film lovers trooping in to see it in cinemas, and the numbers it’s raking in at the box office. Reports have it that the Yoruba epic has crossed the N300M mark in the box office making it the first indigenous film to hit that milestone.

The primary question to ask is how the movie was able to get to that milestone, especially for a movie that is in full Yoruba, but the answer is not very hard. The film has many brilliant elements that will make anyone that has seen it talk about it with someone else, and word of mouth can be said to be one of the best forms of marketing. The team behind ‘King of Thieves (Ogundabede) understood that and took advantage of it.

Of all the things people speak about in the movie, a number of them stand out that made the film a brilliant work of art.

Brilliant Storytelling

A film is nothing without a solid story and this has been proven a number of times with stories that had an incredible cast but flopped because the story was not interesting enough. ‘King of Thieves (Ogundabede) is on a different level with the storytelling.

The film was opened in an art gallery where we were introduced to our narrator who lead us into the main story showing Ageshinkole as the villain. We were led through the story of how a king ascended in the town of Ajeromi, and how stealing is a grave offense in the village. Tying this to Ageshinkole, we were led to see how much of a trouble he posed for Ajeromi and the ways the tried to put an end to his reign of terror.

Apart from the subtitle that did justice in guiding the non-Yorubas that watched the film, the narrator (Segun Arinze) did a great job with the narration, telling the viewers everything that happened in the story.

The Casts

Star-studded movies flop more than half of the time either because the story is not solid or because roles are given to those who have no business playing those roles. ‘King of Thieves (Ogundabede) was an exception. Odunlade Adekola in the role of the king delivered an excellent performance with his body language, expressions and actions, while Femi Adebayo Salami played the perfect villain. It is still a wonder how he kept the white in his eyes there for all the parts he did in the movie. Ibrahim Chatta played his hunter role so carefully and perfectly and made no mistake while he switched to become a warrior, while Peju Ogunmola was a proper ‘Iya Agba’ (Mother).

Other casts of the film like Dele Odule, Toyin Abraham, Adebayo Salami, Wale Akorede, Ebun Oloyede, Ibrahim Yekeen, Lateef Adedimeji, Aishat Lawal, amongst many others contributed to the robust cast of the film, giving a stellar performance.

However, ‘King of Thieves (Ogundabede) was not without its flaws. There are some tiny details that might not be obvious to others but was there in the production of the movie that could have been better.

Continuity

It would be unfair to say the continuity is poor because of one tiny detail but the fact that the detail was ignored or not noticed created the first flaw in the movie.

The prince had earlier on spoken to his mother that he was going out and his mother and instructed that he made sure he goes out with guards because of the chaos in town and he had agreed. The next scene then showed Ageshinkole and his gang causing pandemonium in the village and the same prince was seen wearing a different cloth from earlier.

If we are to make an excuse for that error, we will say that scene was meant to be another day but the right continuity would have made it happen in the same day with the prince still in the same cloth instead of having the viewers try to put the pieces together by themselves.

VFX Effect

Nollywood still has a long way to go with VFX effects and ‘King of Thieves (Ogundabede) is another proof to that.

From the poor whirlwind effect – that had people outside of it rolling in one spot – to the unreal bees Abegunde (Lateef Adedimeji) released when he was fighting Ageshinkole, the VFX effects were just poor, it would have been really noticeable if the story was not interesting.

Conclusion

Overall, ‘King of Thieves (Ogundabede) is a good watch that gets a solid 8 out of 10. The storytelling is brilliant, the casting is perfect, the narration is top-notch and the sound is superb. These and many more confirms why it is doing well with the box office numbers.