In Film Review
.......................
Name: Nagari 1 and 2
Company: Saruauniya Film Kano
Producer: Auwal Muhd Sabo
Director: Aminu Muhd Sabo
Year: 2001
@mallamabubakaar
I was swallowed in boredom and lonesome
silence of my room. The Danwake I cooked was badly done, coarse and unripened. I
was frightened. “People” were unavailable, imagining the boredom and loneliness
that stretched forth and waited my night.
I went to the school wi-fi and downloaded old Hausa
movies, those films that lightly carry me to the past, like bird flapping in
the wind, to the days of innocence and simplicity. Thanks to Fatima-Jika for
leaving her computer with me like she doesn’t like it.
I watched Nagari in rush memories,
of nostalgia, each scene presenting an incident that happened exactly in my
life while watching the film as a boy. The past will seem alterable and
rewindable but it cannot be accurately recreated.
There is a woman that we gathered
and watched movies in her home. One day, I walked to her home and played an old
Kannywood song. She lowered her head in meloncholy, sad and happy and emotional,
as she remembered the days of her bridehood. Friends that we watched movies
together are no longer available. The routine life then was play, school and
movies.
There is no contestation to the
fact that Nagari is a real depiction of Hausa society, both in positive and
negative ways, with high probable coincidences, from dressing to setting to the
character dialogue and action, intrigues and machinations of the husband’s
family. Parents are respectable and children adorable.
The strong father figure is well
depicted in both rural poor family as well as urban middle class life. Culturally,
as a husband you cannot give room to your wife such that she can be
disrespectful to your people. You cannot as well allow your people to maltreat
your wife. Alhaji balances the two.
Northern culture is not known for
the open expression of love - these days people roll with time. There is no
vulgar romance, nor inappropriate touching but the love is still there, so
strongly expressed in the way Biba shyly watches her husband and defends him in
his absence. Alh. Umaru is unfailingly on the side of his wife albeit secretly
and tactful. Such emotional solidarity,
such show of love, could only be found in a couple with deep romantic intimacy.
Amarya (Biba) is a typical
traditional northern woman, passive and unassertive in the face of injustice.
She is a dutiful mother, obedient wife, prayerful, benevolent and patient to
the oppression of her sisters-in-law.
Biba has very well acted her
roles, both as youthful wife and then as a wrinkled old woman. The first stage
of her life resurrected joyous memories, many women the age of my mother will
definitely identify with the house arrangement, the furniture, the framed
family picture on the wall and the general loving atmosphere of shy young
couple, with two or three children enjoying happy family life in a cosy little
home that must be disturbed by women on husband’s side.
We learn that passivity in the
northern woman is passed from mother to daughter. As Biba aged, after her
forced remarriage to Alhaji’s brother, Buba, she too has approved in solemn
words the marriage of her daughter Nafisa (Hadiza Kabara) to Abba (Ali Nuhu)
despite that it is his parents that are maltreating her. With the emerging new
woman and all very few in-laws would risk interfering and messing up with their
daughters-in-law.
The film succeeds in moving the
audience. We love those who love Amarya and hate those who hate her. So moving
that even as a grownup I cannot help shedding tears in the reunion with her son.
Nagari is not without its demons,
however. Hajiya’s home at the opening scene is not actually the village we are
told. Sometimes the activities of the characters are too unreal and artificial.
I beat time with my head and sang
the famous “Lale Maraba Lale” enmeshed and soaked in ringing nostalgia. When I
got married I would watch old movies with my family and ask Halima what is her
experience. The other day I was thinking maybe the cinema houses may latch onto
the idea of repremiering these movies, do some hype and reap cash from people
with shared memory.
I didn’t know the word or how to
express it in my childhood about the infatuation among the trio of Kannywood star
actresses - Fati, Abida and Maijidda. But
as I watched the movies pushing hard the
food down my throat, I discovered Fati Muhammad was my crush.
