Some romantic comedies get by purely on charm, and "Isoken" is exactly that kind of film — gorgeous to look at, easy to fall into, and comfortable enough with its own predictability that it never really apologizes for it. Released in 2017 as the directorial debut of Jadesola Osiberu, the film became one of the more talked-about Nollywood romances of its era, not because it broke new ground with its plot, but because of how confidently and beautifully it told a story audiences already knew the shape of.
The Setup: 34, Single, and Everyone Has an Opinion About It
We meet Isoken, played by Dakore Egbuson-Akande, at her youngest sister's wedding, a setting immediately rich with the kind of chaotic, oversized energy Nigerian weddings are known for. Isoken isn't there to be the center of attention. She just wants to help make sure the guests are fed and looked after. But the wedding won't let her fade into the background — she's already celebrated two younger sisters getting married before her, and at 34, still single, she's become the family's unofficial cautionary tale.
That pressure comes from everywhere, but it's her mother, played with real comic sharpness by Tina Mba, who applies it most visibly, parading Isoken in front of a seemingly perfect suitor named Osaze, played by Joseph Benjamin, right there at the wedding. Isoken is smart, accomplished, financially independent, and surrounded by people who genuinely love her, but none of that matters to a culture that's decided a woman her age without a husband is a problem that needs urgent fixing.
Two Men, One Impossible Choice
Osaze is, on paper, exactly what everyone wants for Isoken — handsome, successful, from a respected Edo family, the textbook definition of ideal Nigerian husband material. The two start dating, and there's real, easy chemistry between them. But then Isoken meets Kevin, played by Marc Rhys, and finds herself unexpectedly drawn to him in a way that catches her off guard. The complication isn't just emotional — it's cultural. Kevin isn't just outside her ethnic group, he's white, and that single fact turns her already loaded love life into something with much bigger social stakes.
Just as things are heating up with Kevin, Osaze — with no idea he even has competition — proposes. Tradition, family pressure, and the sheer weight of everyone's expectations push Isoken toward saying yes, even though her heart is clearly somewhere else. The rest of the film follows her working up the courage to choose what she actually wants over what everyone else has already decided is best for her.
Dakore Egbuson-Akande in Her Best Element
If there's one reason critics keep returning to "Isoken" years after its release, it's Dakore's performance. Multiple reviewers have singled it out as one of her most fully realized roles, praising how effortlessly she moves between funny, classy, girly, grounded, and quietly frustrated — sometimes within the same scene. It's a performance that captures the specific exhaustion of a woman who's built a genuinely good life for herself, only to have that life constantly treated as incomplete by people who've decided her worth is tied to her marital status.
Joseph Benjamin brings real warmth to Osaze, making it easy to understand why Isoken would consider settling for the "safe," expected choice, while Marc Rhys — playing one of the rarer instances of a well-cast foreign actor in a Nollywood lead role — avoids the usual pitfalls of stunt casting, delivering a performance that reviewers have noted actually fits the role rather than simply filling a marketing checkbox. The supporting cast is stacked with talent, including Funke Akindele, Lydia Forson, Damilola Adegbite, Patrick Doyle, Rita Edward, and a young Timini Egbuson in an early role, several years before he became one of Nollywood's biggest leading men in his own right.
What the Film Gets Right
Beyond the central love triangle, "Isoken" uses its premise to quietly interrogate something real: the specific pressure Nigerian women face to perform a certain kind of femininity depending on who they're trying to attract. The film draws a sharp visual contrast between how Isoken presents herself around Osaze — dressed up, made up, hair covered by a wig — versus how comfortable and unguarded she is around Kevin, natural hair and all. It's a detail that's easy to miss on a casual watch but says a lot about the quiet cost of constantly adjusting yourself to fit someone else's idea of the "right" partner.
The film also earns real credit for a beautifully judged conversation between Isoken and her father, played by Patrick Doyle, where he tells her plainly to make her choice based on her own happiness rather than appearances — a rare moment in the genre where a parental figure actually supports independent decision-making instead of reinforcing the pressure everyone else in the story is piling on.
Visually, the film is a genuine standout for Nollywood at the time. Reviewers have repeatedly used the word "beautiful" to describe nearly every element — the wardrobe, the wedding sequences, the soundtrack, and the overall polish of the production, which reflected real ambition and attention to detail that wasn't always the norm in Nigerian cinema at that point.
Where the Film Falls Short
None of this is to say "Isoken" is flawless. Its central plot is, by its own reviewers' repeated admission, entirely predictable — a familiar rom-com shape that most viewers will see coming from the very first act. Some scenes suffer from noticeably stagey dialogue delivery, where actors read as though they're simply waiting for their cue to speak rather than genuinely reacting to one another, a flaw that shows up in roughly a fifth to a quarter of the film according to some reviewers.
There's also a fair critique that the film raises the genuinely interesting subject of interracial dating without doing much to explore its harder edges — the real social friction, stereotypes, and misconceptions that come with it are gestured at rather than meaningfully unpacked. And in a detail that's drawn its share of pointed commentary, the film's climactic wedding scene at the end isn't actually Isoken's own wedding, which strikes some viewers as an odd narrative choice for a story so centered on her journey toward marriage.
The opening scene has also drawn some specific criticism for a cultural mismatch: despite being set at a Benin wedding rich with Edo cultural detail, the scene opens to an Igbo-language song rather than something rooted in Benin musical tradition — a small but noticeable inconsistency in an otherwise carefully art-directed film.
Recognition and Legacy
Despite its flaws, "Isoken" performed well critically and went on to win Best Film West African and Best Director at the 2018 Africa Magic Viewers' Choice Awards, along with Best Foreign Film at the BronzeLens Film Festival in Atlanta and the Prix du Public at Nollywood Week Paris, both also in 2018. That international recognition speaks to how well the film traveled beyond Nigeria's borders, a genuine achievement for a directorial debut working with a fairly familiar romantic comedy formula.
Final Verdict
"Isoken" isn't trying to reinvent the romantic comedy, and it never pretends otherwise. What it offers instead is a genuinely well-made, beautifully shot, and warmly performed version of a story Nollywood has told many times, elevated by a career-best performance from Dakore Egbuson-Akande and a script willing to at least gesture toward real questions about race, tradition, and what women are allowed to want for themselves. It's predictable, occasionally uneven in its smaller performances, and doesn't dig quite as deep into its more provocative themes as it could have — but as an easy, good-looking, emotionally satisfying watch, it holds up well nearly a decade later.
Rating: 4 out of 5 — A gorgeously produced, well-acted romantic comedy that trades originality for genuine warmth, anchored by one of Dakore Egbuson-Akande's most memorable performances.
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