Just 3 Days, Part II (Ghana, 2015)

Is it ironic that it took me four days to watch Just 3 Days? The problem wasn’t just that the film in total is over two and a half hours long. It’s more that, once I got through Part I and started in on Part II, the film became so abundant with craziness that I was making screen captures at a rate of two a minute. Seriously, if you are someone who comes to a movie like this for the crude special effects, outrageous violence, CG blood spatter, and abundant backyard kung fu fights, Ugandan action auteur Ninja has done you the favor of back loading all of that into Just 3 Days’ manic second installment. Of course, that is not to say that the first half, with its unique blend of Christian evangelism and kick-boxing, is not worth an at least cursory look.

Part II begins right where Part I left off, with the trio of kick-boxer Desmond (Akwasi I. Kwarteng), his sister Sophia (Priscilla A. Annabel--who is also credited with Make-up and “Welfare”), and off-and-on best friend Lucas (Osei Owusu) escaping from the Underworld with a magical golden box that they believe will lift the bad luck that has befallen them due to the ill-fated marriage of Desmond’s miniature brother, Dominic (Jospeh Osei) to the allegedly cursed Annah (Elizabeth Arthur.) [Pauses for breath.] Never mind that this magic golden box answers more accurately to the description “yellow plastic box.” What matters is that its theft has roused two of the box’s guardian spirits, who take off in pursuit of Desmond and his partners.

The first of these spirits is Iron Eagle (Akwasi Kwarteng), a primitive computer animation of a giant robot eagle who, upon entering the mortal world, transforms into an imposing and brooding human figure in Ray-bans and a hooded black nylon cape. The other is Tanya (Mabel Amitoh), a flaming statue who likewise transforms into a fiery eyed vixen who, in a nice Max Headroom-like touch, has cornrows the size of actual corn rows. Tanya’s attire is limited to a black sports bra and biker shorts. If you have ever wondered if there was a mall in Hell, and, specifically, if it had a Sports Chalet, Iron Eagle and Tanya’s combined attire should answer your question.

Immediately upon her arrival, Tanya hooks up with two prostitutes who, inspired to pity by her meager coverings, offer to take her in. Meanwhile, Iron Eagle wastes no time in tracking Desmond down and offering him an ultimatum: return the gold box within just 3 days or die horribly along with all of his loved ones. And, yes, you are correct in noting that Ninja has waited until well into his film’s second installment to provide a context for its title.

Just 3 Days being the film that it is, Desmond takes this news home to Sophia and Lucas, after which the three of them engage in a shouty debate over what they should do. Meanwhile, the unsubtly named Pastor Christian (Iddrisu Mohammed Abdallah), a character whose every entrance is marked by the sudden appearance of Christian soft rock on the soundtrack, pays a visit to Dominic and his mother, Madam K (Rose Mensah). Christian has somehow learned of the theft of the box and beseeches Dominic and Madame K to solve their problem through prayer rather than black magic. Thus does this scene set in motion the see-saw that will characterize Just 3 Days concluding half, with sequences in which people’s heads are impaled with katanas alternating with—and being given equal weight as—those in which characters carry on sincere sounding debates about faith.

Such is the dichotomy of Ghanaian cinema, whose country of origin boasts a powerful Christian majority—most of whom, like many other people in the world, nonetheless want to see movies in which shit blows up and people get gorily mowed down with machine guns. Given this, it is legitimate to wonder whether Ninja—whose credits for Just 3 Days include Executive Producer, Writer, Director, Editor and Special Effects director—has a sincere commitment to such issues of faith, or whether presenting them is simply part of the dance he must perform in order for his films to be commercially successfully. It’s conceivable that, like Uganda’s Isaac Nabwana, he’d prefer to skip the religion altogether and just get to the explosions.

If that’s the case, the judiciousness with which Ninja weaves this moral debate into the film’s action is all the more commendable. Unlike the Nigerian film 666 (Beware The End is at Hand), whose surfeit of prosthelytizing made it leaden despite its preponderance of digitally rendered insanity, Just 3 Days trots along at an energetic pace despite it. It also has to be said that what scenes there are of people sitting on their front porches and arguing while fanning themselves accomplish, as they do in 2016, the mean feat of infusing this tale of murderous hell robots with the homely rhythms of everyday life. It is hot in Ghana, after all, so is it not conceivable that its people, made testy by the heat, might wile away the hours by lazily bickering with one another over Mirinda sodas?

Back in the story of Just 3 Days, Desmond, Dominic, and Sophia’s numerous expendable and as-yet-unnamed siblings find the rhythms of everyday life becoming an ever-diminishing commodity as they are killed one by one by Iron Eagle and Tanya. In response, Madam K, a former soldier, goes commando, confronting Tanya in full combat gear—only to beat a hasty retreat when Tanya’s head turns into a flaming death's head before her eyes (not unlike Fantomah.) Later, Tanya further proves that she is a formidable foe, murdering someone simply by spitting magic into her cell phone.

Finally, Desmond and Lucas go to an apparently very well connected kick-boxing promoter named Owen (Emmanuel Afriyie) for help. He presents them with a pair of magic candles, which he will give them on the condition that Desmond waves his payment for an upcoming, high-profile fight. These candles, once the proper incantations have been intoned, provide the men an audience with an underworld being known as the Wise Man. This creature promises to give them a pair of bracelets that will render them invincible if they will provide him with two human hearts—women’s hearts, to be exact. Desmond and Lucas agree to this without hesitation. This is followed by a well-executed sequence in which shots of Desmond’s match alternate with shots of Lucas stalking and killing two women on a deserted country road.

And it is here that Just 3 Days put us on harsh notice that the men we have been positioned to see as its protagonists may not be worthy of it—and that a conclusion in which good triumphs over evil may not look the way we earlier might have assumed it would. What we can be certain of, however, is that that conclusion will only come on the tail end of a lot of kick boxing.

Within the context of African action cinema, Just 3 Days strikes me as an ambitious film—and an indication that Ninja, in his own excitable way, is trying to drag that cinema into the 21st Century. For one thing, its melding of genres—sports drama, horror film, family melodrama, religious parable—seems deliberate and self conscious, rather than the usual reckless hodgepodge of commercial elements. Also, it juggles audience expectations with an unexpected—and almost malicious—deftness. Both of these are indications of a growing confidence on the part of the filmmaker, and bode well for the future of his industry. While so many of the national cinemas covered in this blog have seen their heydays come and go, Africa’s is still an electrifying work in progress whose best days are yet to come.

Just 3 Days, Part I (Ghana, 2015)

When we last checked in on Ghana’s Ninja Productions, they were providing us with as much spectacle as a single digit special effects budget could provide in 2011’s presciently named 2016, a film about a small Ghanaian town invaded by baby-punting ColecoVision aliens. 2015’s Just 3 Days tells a somewhat more complicated tale, involving kick-boxing, family secrets, and an ill-advised journey into Hell.

Ninja stock player Rose Mensah stars as Serwaah, the mother of kick-boxer Desmond and his brother Dominic, a sweet natured soul who is also, among many other things, a little person. Dominic is played by another Ninja standby, Joseph “Wayoosi” Osei. Due to Osei’s uniquely child-like appearance, it’s often difficult to tell whether he is meant to be playing an adult or an especially precocious (and often evil) kid. In this case, specific reference is made to his condition, which gives the actor a rare opportunity to portray a character that is presented in a sympathetic light. Osei truly steps up to the task, delivering what I have to say is an accomplished performance. A scene in which Serwaah details the hardships of raising and caring for Dominic as he sobs quietly in the background is especially affecting.

Anyway, it seems that Serwaah and her family have been plagued by a prolonged streak of bad luck, which seems to have coincided with Dominic’s marriage to Anna, the sister of Desmond’s best friend, Lucas. They assume that Anna must be under some kind of curse, as one well might. Desmond confides this to Lucas, who, despite being sworn to secrecy, immediately runs and tells his mother, forcing her to come clean with him and his siblings. They are indeed cursed, she tells them, and it is the result of one of their ancestors entering into a “bad covenant”, one in which he or she chose to exchange happiness in love for long life. As a result, the members of their family live to a very advanced age, but always, upon finding true love, suffer the death of that loved one very shortly afterward. Their women are also sterile and those children that are born, like Lucas and Anna, are kind of dumb—and, as a result, unable to go to college and get a good job (something that Just 3 Days repeatedly stresses the importance of.)

Desmond’s sister, Sophia, another dummy, somehow overhears this conversation among Lucas’ family and rushes home to tell her mother. And if at this point you’ve guessed that Just 3 Days is set in the same town as the other Ninja movies I’ve reviewed--i.e. a sun-blasted hell hole of malicious gossip and neighbor-on-neighbor back stabbing (and which I have to assume is somewhere in, or on the outskirts of, Kumasi)—, you deserve to give yourself the most sparkly sticker in the box. Almost every plot development in this movie is driven by someone nosing around in someone else’s business and then summarily ratting them out, and, in this case, it leads to Serwaah making a startling revelation to her kids.

She tells them how, on a recent trip to Israel, she met a “strange woman” who, upon hearing of her predicament, presented her with three magical items--which comes as a harsh blow to those of us who went to Israel and came back with only a souvenir dreidel. Serwaah presents these items to her children, an event whose solemnity is undermined somewhat by those items being wrapped in a used FedEx envelope like those supplies you stole from the office last week. They are revealed to be a book, a map, and a key. These, Serwaah tells them, will open a gateway to the “underworld” and lead them to a golden box that, when opened, will free them of their curse.

This revelation sets off all of the shouting and quarreling that fills in the non-action parts of so many Ghanaian action movies. One might think it was a country in which no argument was settled in a calm and reasoned manner. It’s all people sitting on their front porches and dabbing the sweat from their brow as they thunder away irritably at one another. (No soda consumption was observed, however.) At least in the case of Just 3 Days these squabbles were subtitled, so I knew what was being discussed. And what was being discussed was not just strategy, but faith. Serwaah, for instance, wants her children to use those magic items to spelunk into Hades and fetch the golden box. Sweet natured Dominic, on the other hand, feels that they should instead seek release from their curse through prayer. Serwaah scoffs at this notion—which is an odd position to take for someone who believes in a literal hell that you can actually visit.

Anyway, because of their town’s aforementioned shittiness, news of the magic key and its companions quickly makes its way back to Lucas and his family. Lucas wastes little time in attempting to steal them in a violent home invasion robbery. When Desmond and his family respond with kick-boxing and bullets, Lucas’ brother Austine swallows the key, only to have it magically extrude itself from his throat when he takes a shot to the head. Desmond and Sophia then recruit a repentant Lucas to take the journey to the underworld with them.

The Underworld, as you might guess, looks like a video game environment, with a lot of looped screaming on the soundtrack to give it that "dude, we are so totally in hell" ambience. The trio makes quick work of capturing the golden box, only to rouse Iron Eagle, the box’s guardian. This Iron Eagle, mind you, should not be confused with the movie starring Louis Gossett Jr.—unless that movie featured a fierce-looking, man-sized robot hawk.

And it is here that Just 3 Days, Part I ends—as it, like all of Ninja Productions’ films, has been transformed into companion films by a simple click of the editor’s blade. While this is a cagey way of getting people to pay twice for the same film, it also alleviates some of the problems common to sequels, like all of the actors looking obviously older than they did in the first film. Also, it’s unlikely that anyone has ever credibly claimed that their childhood memory of Just 3 Days, Part I was “raped” by Just 3 Days, Part II.

Although I am going to emulate the makers of Just 3 Days and take a powder between reviews, I wanted to say that, at this point, I’m enjoying the movie quite a bit. It seems like an improvement on the earlier Ninja Films, both in terms of having a more cinematic look and uniformly good performances. Which is not to say that it doesn’t have its flaws; some clumsy scene transitions among them, as well as a series of noisome in-film plugs that, while refreshingly honest, make Hollywood’s approach to product placement seem subtle by comparison.

In any case, I enjoyed Just 3 Days, Part I enough that I am now looking forward to seeing what Just 3 Days, Part II holds in store. Let’s hope that it doesn’t disappoint me. (You wouldn’t like me when I’m disappointed.)

2016 Part 2 (Ghana, 2011)

I approached 2016 Part 2 with a lot of excitement. Really. That’s because all of the highlights from the mind blowing 2016 trailer were in Part 1, which meant that Part 2 was mostly uncharted territory. I mean, I won’t go so far as to say that 2016 Part 2 was cloaked in mystery, but it at least had a light cardigan of mystery draped casually over its shoulders. Who could imagine what it might contain?

In my review of Part 1, I related to you that that film ended with our hero, Mr. Oppong, receiving some kind of ultimatum from the aliens. That, it turns out, was wrong. It was an assumption on my part, based on untranslated dialog—and, as we all know, “assume” makes an “ass” out of someone named “Ume”. What was actually happening is that Mr. Oppong was eavesdropping on the aliens without their knowledge and just happened to hear their next plan of attack. BTW, I am here and only here going to entertain the conceit that 2016 Part 2 is a separate film from Part 1 by saying that Ebenezer Donkor here returns as Mr. Oppong, even though it is clearly one movie that has been arbitrarily cut in half in order to sell more VCDs.

Soon we are gifted with another dispatch from Ghana’s least invested TV news anchor, who distractedly gives us the English version of the Aliens’ master plan. It seems that the aliens have somehow managed to turn the cell phones of everyone in Ghana into bombs. “By tomorrow at 12:00,” she tells us, “every phone is going to explode.” Then, in strict adherence to the journalistic code, she advises her audience to “pass this message on”. She further advises them to turn their cell phones off, ensuring that every person over 60 who never turns their cell phone on will mistakenly turn it on and be blown to smithereens as a result.

Sincerely, though, you’d think that such a simple plan of action might be easy enough to follow through on, but in 2016 Part 2 it only gives the characters further reason to bicker at each other while consuming endless bottles of soda. These people clearly didn’t get the same memo about Ghana being “the most peaceful land on Earth” that the aliens did, as they are seemingly incapable of communicating other than with balled fists and bared teeth. Only the character played by little person actor Joseph "Wayoosi" Osei shows any industry, attempting to hack into his phone and disarm it. Even Oppong’s teenage daughter, Cara (Prescilla Anabel, who is also credited with doing the film’s makeup and something called “Welfare”) can only carry this news so far down the road before stopping to have a screaming match with somebody.

All of this takes up most of the film’s first twenty minutes, during which we see very little of the aliens. In fact, 2016 Part 2 is very stingy with its aliens throughout, only pausing occasionally for one of them to stroll rigidly into frame to chuck a horribly rendered CG motorcycle at someone or decapitate them with an also horribly rendered boomerang. In most cases, their presence is only indicated by shots of people running away while looking fearfully over their shoulder at nothing. It is hard for me to believe that the effects sequences in this movie would be so costly that cutting back on them would be a budgetary decision, but that might just be my First World privilege talking.

Likewise, 2016 Part 2 does little to add upon the creative carnage of its predecessor, but for one thing: Apparently the aliens have taken the time between parts 1 and 2 to learn kung fu. This means that, if you felt the films in the Alien and Predator franchises were lacking for not having scenes of their titular creatures delivering flying kicks to the faces of unsuspecting humans, you will now feel that a grave injustice has been righted.

Anyway, now that the aliens have truly revealed themselves as typical low budget action film villains, the solution to the problem they present is obvious. All that’s needed is the creation of a Terminator-like cyborg to fight them, a task that Mr. Oppong completes in record time. This stoic killing machine (Ntul Andrew, in a role in every way identical to the one he played in B 14) is then set loose to casually stroll along the same quiet suburban streets that all of 2016’s action takes place in and dismember any alien he comes across.

There then follows more bickering, lots of it, and mostly between women, which gives this portion of the film the feeling of a Bravo reality show sponsored by Orange Crush. There is also a prayer circle with people speaking in tongues. Finally, in a scene lasting literally less than 10 seconds, the cyborg leaps into space and somehow blows up the alien mother ship, which prompts the statement/question: “So wait… You mean you could’ve done that all along?”

Because I loved both 2016 Part 1 and B 14, I really wanted to at least like 2016 Part 2, but, sadly, the film’s ceaseless Housewives of Kumasi style caterwauling—minus the mitigation of people angrily spraying soda pop on one another--erased every last scrap of charity in my heart. You’d think that filming a movie in one go and then cutting it in half would be an ideal way to avoid the dreaded sequel slump, but, perhaps honoring tradition, 2016 Part 2 beats the odds and delivers the very type of bitter disappointment that we have long ago become accustomed to. Given that, my only advice is to ignore its existence completely.

As a public service to those of you who plan to download 2016 Part 1, and would like to walk away from it with a sense of closure, I suggest you append to it the following title card, which I offer free of charge:

(Spoiler)

2016 Part 1 (Ghana, 2011)

In 1912, cartoonist Windsor McCay used the available technology to make Gertie the Dinosaur, a short film in which a live action McCay appeared to be interacting with a cartoon dinosaur. In 1945, using a related but much more sophisticated technique, MGM gave us Gene Kelly dancing with a cartoon mouse in Anchors Aweigh. Finally, in 2011, 2016 director Ninja used the technology available to him to integrate ColecoVision quality computer animated aliens into footage of various people bickering on their front porches.

2016 is a movie that I am obligated to review by virtue of my having long ago joined the internet chorus of people trumpeting on about its insane trailer—and this despite the fact that all of you with any interest in seeing it have most likely tracked it down already. In that case, you already know that it is essentially a no-budget remake of Independence Day set in the suburbs of Ghana. And if that sounds like a massive over-reach to you, you obviously know very little about Ghanaian action cinema, and even less about the films of maverick multi-hyphenate Ninja.

As you might recall, I introduced Ninja to 4DK’s readers with my review of his/her B 14, an earlier film in which the producer-director-writer-cinematographer-editor employed no end of bargain basement movie magic to tell a tale involving a child crime lord, a voodoo powered android that shoots endless lengths of chain out of his palms, and a lot of CG blood spatter. Those who are fond of that film will find much cause for reminiscence in 2016, as it contains most of the same cast and locations.

2016 lacks the breakneck pacing of B 14, in part because Ninja chooses to give his alien invasion tale the simmering build-up of a 1970s disaster movie—or, come to think of it, Independence Day. In that tradition, we are first given a portent of the disaster to come, in a scene in which a scientist seated at a table full of computer monitors in front of a white sheet catches sight of the alien mother ship orbiting just above earth’s atmosphere. We are then given a glimpse inside the spaceship, where a trio of alien creatures eyes a hologram of the Earth covetously. These appear to have been lifted from a bootleg Alien vs. Predator handheld video game and mashed-up into one franchise-bridging hybrid—a Predatalien, if you will.

Then it is time to meet the large cast of characters whose lives will be effected by the disaster. This is accomplished in a series of vignettes featuring various pairs of people having animated conversations either on the front porches of their houses or on the stoops outside their apartments. Much soda pop is consumed. My take away from this is that (a) Ninja was not equipped to shoot indoors and (b) it’s hot in Ghana.

Unfortunately, the version of 2016 that I watched was not subtitled. I’m confident that, if it had been, 2016 would have revealed itself to be, if not a more complex film than it otherwise appeared, at least a more convoluted one, as there is a lot of chatter going on throughout. In any case, this is just my interpretation, but it seemed to me that all of those conversations during its first act were fractious in tone. It also seemed that the pending alien visitation was the subject of most of them, and that a lot of incredulity was being expressed over the idea that visitors from outer space would choose Ghana as their touchdown point. Meanwhile, the scientist, Mr. Oppong (played by B 14’s Ebenezer Donkor) has been sounding the alarm about the maybe invasion and meeting with a lot of skeptical pushback from the populace, who just want to be left to sit in the sun and drink their pop.

Whatever was being discussed, what was unmistakable was the frequency of references to Ghana in these conversations. And this was something I loved about 2016: unlike other productions, which try to make vague their provenance in order to have more international appeal, it seems determined to never let you forget that it is a film made by Ghanaians in Ghana about Ghana. It even seems to take a peculiar sort of patriotic pride in the idea that Ghana would be the target of an alien attack. Whether intended or not, this puts in unflattering contrast the chauvinism of those many American films that take for granted that any life form who would take the trouble of traveling billions of light years to Earth would first stop off in New York or Washington.

Anyway, Mr. Oppong’s “I told you so” moment comes when the aliens contact him directly to communicate their plans. This is followed by the film’s one English language sequence, in which a somnolent TV newsreader relays the Aliens’ intentions in the most blasé manner possible. The aliens, she tells us, have “shown interest in Ghana” and, after some investigation, have determined that it is “the most peaceful land on Earth.” Because of this, they have decided that they will “migrate here by 2016.” Of course, they must first wipe out the country’s entire population. “The destruction,” she concludes, “can be any moment from now.”

I have to say that this plan shows a shrewd understanding on the aliens’ part of the ignorance and indifference with which most of the world at large regards virtually anything that happens in Africa. Seriously, if the entire population of Ghana was replaced by insectoid space aliens, could you imagine anyone at your office job being aware of it, even if George Clooney had made a documentary about it?

With this revelation out of the way, all the carnage promised by 2016’s trailer is soon to follow. It will be noted, however, that the aliens take a very intimate, one-at-a-time approach to exterminating the populace, in that almost all of these scenes involve a single alien stalking a single fleeing victim through the deserted streets. These sequences momentarily give 2016 the feel of a Friday the 13th style slasher movie, albeit one shot entirely in the blazing sunlight. It is also these sequences that deliver both of the trailer’s most notorious money shots, by which I of course refer to the toddler who gets kicked into the stratosphere and the lady who gets squashed by a very poorly rendered airborne sports car.

In saying that 2016 is more deliberately paced than B 14, I in no way mean to imply that it is a less entertaining film. The sheer lunacy of its action and special effects sequences is enough to maintain an air of excited anticipation throughout its more talky bits. And those bits themselves contain much to keep us entertained, such as the impressive assortment of bootleg tee shirts worn by the cast and the odd mundane details that Ninja chooses to focus on. The only way you could be disappointed by it is to expect it to live up to its trailer, a feat that no film could accomplish.

Like many African exploitation films, 2016 became an instant franchise at the moment of it being shorn into two halves. Thus Part 1 ends with a cliffhanger in which the aliens deliver to Mr. Oppong some kind of ultimatum. What is it? I have no idea (no subtitles, remember?) Nonetheless I am going to ask that you remain in suspense until I get around to watching Part 2. Stay tuned!