Film Review: PAWN

• Movie Title: Pawn
• Running Time: 1hr, 55 mins
• Director: Pascal AKA
• Genre: Psychological Thriller

Cast: Adjetey Annan, Sika Osei, Prince David Osei, Lydia Forson, Gloria Sarfo

If you are a fan of film who follows fandom activities, you will discover that Film buffs usually have very nerdy reasons why they love a certain film, probably because of a film’s technical ability, the role it played in evolving a particular genre, a memorable story or just the commercial success. One reason to love films that fans often overlook is when a film pushes the needle in the country or region the film was made from. Look through history and you will find films that were either so commercially successful or artistically impressive that it inspired other filmmakers to take their cameras and make films. It’s this mostly overlooked angle that i believe PAWN matters as a film in the first place. But for purposes of understanding how important this film is Ghana’s modern film industry, I will have to paint the picture of the not so impressive world Ghanaian films live in today.

Ghanaian films haven’t been at their ultimate best in the past couple of years, the previously bustling film scene and leader of commercial films on the African continent has been struggling for the past couple of years, Critics have cited a number of reasons including lack of investment coupled with micro economic factors, absence of a large market and not enough cinemas to screen and promote films. In my opinion, I think a major reason is the switch from physical CDS  to streaming platforms which disrupted an industry that relied heavily on CD sales and was just adapting to big cinema culture. Now that this backdrop has been established, let’s move to PAWN.

PAWN comes from a Production house that’s a fairly new player in the movie production business but not so new to the entertainment space as a whole. Over the years, Lynx Entertainment can boast of being the only standing institution in the music business in Ghana with over 15 years experience producing some of Ghana’s biggest Artists like Kidi, Kuami Eugene, Asem, Eazzy and its founder Richie Mensah. 

After a successful run in the music business over the years, the music powerhouse has decided to venture into film and PAWN is their first offering. 

On the surface, PAWN is a psychological thriller similar to an M Night Shyamalan film; we meet a police inspector played by Ghanaian Actor Adjetey Anan who is obsessed with his work, ambitious in cracking down crime and solving his cases so much that he sometimes takes unconventional approaches like abusing his subjects but this is mainly because he is battling multiple personality disorder, described in the film as “Dissociative identity disorder” which was incited by an incident in his childhood. This “Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde’ type mystery plays a key role in the film introducing us to this character and how his condition spurs him to work obsessively but at the same time makes him a despicable crime fighter. This character flaw, despite being familiar, gives us a glimpse into who the character is in a few moments when the other personalities reveal information from the character’s past or his inner thoughts.

For such an impressive antihero character, the film fails to provide a believable plot and setting for its characters to live in, often failing to draw its audience in. This is mainly due to its overly used interior scenes and studio setups which boxes performances of the main characters and also restricts storytelling unlike seen in many high thriller investigative movies where the cop moves through many high action and thrilling scenes to prove how much obsessed with his work the character is. However I believe that with enough resources this wouldn’t have been the creative choice of the production team. As I stated earlier, this film finds itself in an industry that struggles to achieve its most ambitious creative taste because of little capital available. This means that filmmakers need to find the most cost effective methods to tell their stories and this filmmaking technique does that well. 

The Director at the helm of affairs in this film is Pascal Aka who has quite a number of critical and commercial success under his belt known recently for his film Gold Coast Lounge which also starred Adjetey Anan and for earlier films like the high action Interception and Redemption. The writer, Director and actor himself also has worked extensively in the music industry directing music videos making his partnership with lynx on this a match made in heaven. Pascal is a master at making thrillers often portraying obsessive characters in his films. He brings that charm and experience to PAWN. Despite presenting a conflicted character on a mission to save himself from himself, his inner conflict isn’t given enough time to grow in the minds of the audience and stakes around the central mystery in the film just aren’t just high enough to connect with the characters as victims. I guess it’s not so easy to get the audience to empathize with a character when he is his own demon and victim.

The story does a good job presenting a mysterious murderer who goes around killing a number of high profile personalities and leaving clues in its wake, again not a new plot device for lovers of investigative film genres. My earlier point about the stakes not being high enough is felt here because these victims are presented as players in a scheme who are deserving of the predicament that befalls them. 

Where the film struggles to make a mark in characterisation and setting, it makes up big time in performance. Most audiences of this film will praise the twist as its best part but mine is the stellar performance by Adjetey Anan whom I call Ghana’s last film star because he is the only male actor I can think of who can sell a movie with his face. In previous films I have seen him act in, I have always felt that Ghanaian directors haven’t been able to portray characters which push him to explore his range of performance and truly this film does just that in a big way. The actor had to play three different characters requiring a change in voice,different use of body and space that I haven’t witnessed any Ghanaian actor perform like that in a while. Ajetey also brings so much depth to his character making the big twist at the end the checkmate that we never expected.

If performance is this film’s real magic, Sika Osei is the magician who brings it to life. Playing a psychologist who nurses the main character’s battle with his psychological trauma, her positioning to the character helps the audience explore his back story more, making us empathise with him. The Ghanaian actress blends between playing a friend and psychologist to the character but also revealing the truth that our character is simply a victim of circumstance. Her character and portrayal of her character is so remarkable I think one of the team’s greatest achievements in this film is casting her for this role.

Well rounded characters are developed by good writers and this film has some really remarkable writing moments albeit the obvious production restrictions. I hold the opinion that it could have done with less dialogue and left viewers to discover certain details for themselves. My investigation to find out who the writer was revealed that the plot was developed through a collaborative effort by the Lynx team but was written by a young lady called Portia. The writer shows a fair understanding of the psychological thriller film genre in terms of how the scale of power dynamics switches between key characters; from being vulnerable, killers to victims

Oh, and the checkmate in all this is the twist at the end which makes this film deserving of every money viewers spend to watch it, it’s so artfully done, catches you off guard and leaves you questioning your own self if you were paying attention the whole time. It’s also what will keep people going back to watch it again and again.

I believe this film will set in motion the new age of Ghanaian commercial films and thats where it’s genius will be marked in time. It pushes the needle of local storytelling and gives us a fair idea of how great films can be made with limited resources we are faced with in our film industry. Most importantly i believe after being successful in marketing and promoting a number of musicians digitally on streaming platforms, Lynx has the expertise and experience to push a movie the same way. Hopefully, a lot more people go to see this film to encourage more films from local production companies and filmmakers.

Great work on Pawn Team Lynx and Pascal Aka. Keep it coming.

PAWN is showing at Silverbird Cinemas in Accra mall and Weija mall