Ebonylife’s A Sunday Affair is chaotic!

A Sunday Affair tells the story of two long time best friends, Toyin (Dakore Egbuson) and Uche (Nse Ikpe-Etim), who fall in love with the same guy, Sunday (Oris Erhuero).

The story

This story is absolutely chaotic in every sense of the word. The film starts with a wedding, and a cheating husband. The beginning of a love story and possibly the end of another.

Sunday, who is at a wedding with his wife and kids decides to follow another woman to a private room and proceeds to have sex with her. He then meets her friend not too long after (on a different day), and they eventually have sex too. Oh yes, Sunday also knows they’re best friends as he met them both on the same day, at the wedding. And yes, Toyin knows that Uche slept with Sunday at the wedding. The film basically tells the story of how he juggles these two women and how the two women lie to each other about their feelings for him until it’s too late. Imagine watching your friend date the man that you love? What a mess!

This drama goes to show how women lie to each other, even when they supposedly tell each other “everything”. While they were at the spa, Uche said “I like my men married” and the other, Toyin, insinuated she wasn’t interested in the almost divorced man. One of them should have marked their territory at this point.

Themes

The film had a strong theme of true and sacrificial friendship. I really enjoyed seeing the bond between Toyin and Uche that had grown from when they were children. They were very supportive to each other — being there for your friend when you are also going through a hard time is really difficult but they both managed to do that for each other.

There were so many ways that Sunday could have altered such a strong bond between sisters, but what I really liked is that they didn’t allow him destroy their friendship even after they had both decided they wanted a relationship with him.

I know this is slightly random, but it was a little refreshing to see what ghosting really looked like for some men. They’re too scared to tell the bitter truth and ghosting obviously serves them better, it’s the easiest way out of difficult conversations.

The film also attempts to portray strength as both women are going through different issues in their lives, but it’s really hard to feel sorry for them with all that’s going on in the film.

Even though Toyin had cancer and even died in the film, I felt more empathy towards Uche. On the outside, she was a strong, independent woman, however behind closed doors, she was broken and constantly crying. She was a slave to the world, a sugar baby with an overly entitled sugar daddy who would belittle her, even in the midst of people. She was desperate to get out of that world, so it makes me wonder, did she really love Sunday or was he just an escape route?

The scene where Toyin is writing a letter in the hospital, and they flashback to the scene where she caught her best friend sleeping with her man, was very problematic. I couldn’t believe all the words in that letter. Everything from I saw you sleeping with my boyfriend to I know you both love each other so now that I’m dead, take care of my baby, and you can both have a good life together????

I’m not really sure what the writer was trying to achieve with all of this!

Cast

I’m impressed by Nse every single time (well maybe 95% of the time). She gave a stellar performance as usual. My favorite scene was the one where she stormed into Sunday’s office after she found out about him and Toyin. Even though she was badly behaved, we could empathize with her in that moment where she knew she had to let out her feelings immediately to Sunday, knowing that she would have to let go of a potential love story with this man, in order to save her friendship.

I also really enjoyed watching the scene where Uche found out about Toyin’s death. It was the physical representation of her heart falling into a million pieces. She breathes in and out in disbelief until she can find a scream. A brilliant scene.

I’m not sure I enjoyed Oris Erhuero’s character. He commanded the presence of a player, and looked the part all the way through but his delivery felt a bit robotic at times, and that annoyed me.

Other standout scenes

• The scene where Sunday and Toyin are in the elevator about to kiss, was really magical and a little funny too.
• The scene where Sunday and Toyin had their first date was nicely shot. How they blurred everyone in the background so we could focus on the budding new couple. The focus is consistent throughout the film.

This is the most dysfunctional love story I’ve ever come across 😂. At the end of the day, two people were rewarded for bad behaviour — c’est la vie!

Rating: 5/10 (the extra one for the pretty colours)

Watch the trailer here: