You’re welcome to the review of “Couple of the Year”. It’s a 2020 movie released from the stables of Christoline Film Productions and was written by Kolade Segun-Okeowo.
As in “Welcome Yesterday”, the prominent use of pictures in the set design is laudable. The way the story is told is nice especially because layers of information unfold as the film goes on. The only issue with the production was the stray audios playing over the actual audio; I found out that using the subtitles helped me in following the story in spite of this.
Couple of the Year is actually an award given in a church pastored by KSO’s character and the response of characters in the film as well as among the audience is mixed. The question remains: Should any couple be awarded Couple of the Year? The debate will continue but I think the motivation for the award is a good one, which is to celebrate couples seen to have shown sufficient proof that they’re worthy of emulation and declared as models for intending couples. The church also has an interesting though controversial policy of newly-weds spending a weekend after their honeymoon at a selected couple’s house, in this case the home of Deacon and Deaconess Farayola, who are seen as a model couple. I really like engaging stories with fictional realities like this which make them more interesting to watch.
The Farayolas, sadly, actually have no virtue in their marriage to be desired. They have been putting up appearances in church that they are in unity, while nothing could be farther from the truth. The couple, played by Adeoye Omoniyi and Sunmbo Segun-Okeowo, have themselves gotten used to the protocol – they have a ready-made kitchen routine and a sermon timed to perfection for new couples.
Right after such mentees leave, the curtains of deceit are pulled off and we see the true state of the Farayola household. Even their daughter in boarding school dreads the thought of coming home which leaves us to only imagine how much of a warzone the home is. Boladale even tries to come clean and doesn’t want to keep living a lie but Adekanmbi is flat out hypocritical and prefers to hold on to the church title and respect he enjoys from people’s false perception of his home; he has the biblical knowledge of marriage but has refused to let it empower him to be a good husband. That made me see that the definition of a lie is anything we don’t see as God sees it.
The most interesting part of the movie for me was where the newly-weds in the movie, though debating the rightness of the award, go ahead to say that prayer youths of this age have been warned not to pray, or at least, to pray with understanding. So, really, unless you’re sure your model couple are truly godly people, don’t pray that your home will be exactly like someone else’s; just ask God to make your marriage the best it can be. Boladale herself says that she pities those using her marriage as a point of contact to pray.
So, Boladale is pushed to the wall and tries to commit suicide; that is when the façade ends and we see the dangers of deception during courtship. In a way, Deacon got his kind; he, a fornicator, wanted a virgin and he got someone who deceived him into believing she was one. They both engaged in one form of deceit or the other in courtship and reaped the harvest of strife in their home. Honesty in courtship is quintessential for really, only God knows the heart of a man, and so, it is important that we allow God to lead us to the right person.
While the Pastor may have wrongly judged the true spiritual state of Deacon and Deaconess Farayola, I think he eventually shows himself as a good pastor. He’s a firm, principled man and calmly gets to the root of the matter in the Farayola household. He then leaves us with a tall but noble order for couples not just to be the couple of the year, but the couple of all time. To the glory of God, they make up and we see a new beginning for the Farayola family.
Till the next review, stay blessed!
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