A look at Teniola Olatoni’s The New Normal

A single mother battles to save her career and only son from crashing, and friends trying their best to keep up appearances and escape societal pressure and family upheaval with their hilarious and always surprising results.

Somewhere within the 138 minutes of Teniola Olatoni’s The New Normal is an interesting and compelling story of admitting one’s failures and taking responsibility for one’s actions, with a stunning cinematography centrepiece and outstanding performances from some of Nigeria’s finest actors.

I think it’s safe to say when Teniola Olatoni teams up with an amazing writer like Tunde Babalola and involves Mercy Johnson-Okojie, Enado Odigie, Femi Jacobs, Yemi Blaq, Meg Otanwa, Richard Mofe Damijo, Kehinde Bankole as ensemble cast, then some wonderful stuff is going to happen on screen.

The New Normal, is all about risks and chances, as four couples and a single friend challenge each other to flout society in this story about individual and collective issues of discrimination, misogyny, addiction, mental health, infertility and nepotism.

These couples are all different from each other in every way possible but yet somehow find themselves bound together. It is not just a funny film, it’s also gripping and thought provoking. Having said that, The New Normal does deal with some important topics which can be triggering for some people. Nevertheless it is portrayed with such conviction, it seems so real.

At its best, The New Normal operates like a first-rate box office offering, complete with slamming doors, twisty plots, intricately strung together jokes and the stellar acting and punch lines give this movie momentum and charm that win you over even if you’re not laughing.

The New Normal is also the best-cast movie of the return to box office season. Mercy Johnson-Okojie is the star actress of the feature and gives the viewer many reasons to see this. Johnson-Okojie, who was frequently brilliant in in her film appearances in the last decade, brings the same prickly intelligence to her role here. Femi Jacobs is a rarity — a brilliant actor with a gift for interpreting any role— while Bankole, the most complex of the characters, manages to find layer after subtle layer in Ejiro’s character flaw.

The movie is elegantly photographed. There is something about friend’s drama that bestows a pleasing structure upon a film. We anticipate that inevitable moment when all happiness seems doomed. The cast is large, well-chosen and diverting. The performances remain strong as the characters are taken through many more than usual paces. This movie actually has the nerve to tell real stories, rather than refusing to embrace change. The producers have managed to keep the audience laughing while becoming the leading fictional forum for addressing real issues.