While some of Nollywood’s youth-centric productions focus on the ideal in addressing issues common to teenagers, like MTV Shuga Naija, others simply focus on reality by showing the world what it’s like to be a teenager today in this part of the world and, by extension, exposing us to a lot of reasons why we should guide and safeguard our teenagers. Let’s take a look at Showmax’s Leaked and see how it buttresses our point.
We can all agree that these times are quite different and today’s teenagers are much more exposed compared to how it was “back in the day”. There is now a lot of knowledge in circulation and teenagers might have a good understanding of the changes going on in their minds and bodies, but ironically, with all this comes fickleness and fragility of heart and mind. The first notable scene that depicts this is when the main character, Monife Olasheye (Tomi Ojo), a bright and exemplary student in her last year of high school, decides to send her boyfriend Moses (Chukwuebuka Ude) nude pictures against her will. She had earlier stated that she wasn’t comfortable doing it, but in Moses’s words, “Other girls have been offering to send me theirs; I just want to be faithful to you.” The fragility of the teenage mind is shown in Monife’s fear of losing her boyfriend over something as seemingly little as nudes, and that one decision is the beginning of her downfall.
Another very important theme in this production is cyberbullying and the desire of teenagers to bring one another down. As it turns out, Monife’s phone is hacked and a blurred version of her nude photo appears on the school blog page, Halloway Tales, the next day! Of course, nobody knows who it is – for a while, at least – but the desire of the person behind the blog to cause a dent in Monife’s reputation is as clear as day. The whole ordeal causes Monife to be deeply troubled and turns her into a shadow of herself; she becomes moody and pale, stops eating well, and her grades even begin to drop. In a particular scene where her mother (Olajumoke LBA) confronts her about the change in her behaviour and performance in school, she calls it an “act” that she’s “putting up”, and this leads us to another key thing to take away from the production.
With all that goes on among teenagers in today’s world, a significant change in behaviour should not be passed off as just an “act” or a “fit”, not when absolutely anything could be going wrong. Monife was dealing with not just the fear of her nudes being exposed, but the fear of her reputation being ruined, her academic ambitions being cut short, and disappointing her parents. To make it worse, she was dealing with it alone. She couldn’t talk to her friends or her parents due to fear and the knowledge that she had disappointed them. The only other person who was a party to the matter, Moses, decided to wash his hands off it, his reason being that he did not want a dent on his reputation, and before we begin to hate him, he was just as much a child as Monife was. His mind was as fickle and fragile as the average teenager’s, so let’s cut him some slack – just a bit.
While Monife is in the eye of this storm in her life, one of her classmates, Nnnena (Celia Okechukwu) runs into her in the restroom and sees her holding a necklace – the same one ‘nude girl’ was wearing – and instantly puts two and two together. But Nnena assures Monife that her secret is safe with her. From then, the two become close friends and Nnena stays by her side in her unrelenting effort to bring down the blog page and find out who is behind it.
Halloway Tales eventually posts a clear version of the nude photo and exposes Monife as ‘nude girl’. Monife is devastated and heartbroken, her parents are disappointed, and her academic ambitions are cut short. She is forced to step down from contesting for the position of head girl and forfeits her application for an ambassadorship. To top it all off, she is suspended from school for two weeks. The suspension period is an extremely lonely time for Monife, but thankfully, Nnena remains at her side and even pays her a visit. In a bid to offer Monife some comfort, Nnena reveals to her that she got pregnant over the holidays after being raped by her cousin and that a number of health complications followed the abortion, and because of this, her father had spent a lot of money on her hospital bills.
The hurricane in Monife’s life takes to a higher velocity when the story Nnena shared with her is published by Halloway Tales. Of course, all fingers point to Monife, seeing that Nnena told her in confidence. At this point, she loses the one shoulder she’s had to lean on in the whole ordeal and Nnena attempts suicide. Nevertheless, she stops at nothing to find out who is behind the page with the help of Tosan (Akintoba Adeoluwa) and experiences a rude shock when they find out the person who had been intent on ruining Monife’s life was her best friend, Tade (Princess Umukoro).
After getting caught, Tade has no choice but to explain herself. According to her, she hacked Monife’s phone and leaked her nude photo because she “just wanted to prove to everyone that she was not as perfect” as they thought, but the deeper reason was that she envied Monife and wanted her life. To her, her best friend has the perfect life while she is just an ordinary girl living in her shadow. In a flashback scene, we see Tade’s mother (Rhoda Albert) scolding her and comparing her to Monife and from there, we can say we understand a little bit. We hear her saying, “Does Monife have two heads?” And when Tade replies that she only avoids social activities and is in fact one of the best students in school, her mother says, “It is not enough” and “Why can’t you be an all-rounder like Monife?” – harsh. The teenage mind is delicate, and as adults, parents, or guardians, we need to be careful with the words we say to them because they affect their self-esteem. Tade’s mother had constantly been feeding her the idea that Monife was better than her, and when she had had enough, she sought to bring her down. She also revealed that her reason for involving Nnnena in the web of scandals is that she saw Nnena as a threat to her friendship with Monife. Phew!
In the end, Tade gets arrested, Nnena begins to respond to treatment, and Monife gets the ambassadorship she’s been gunning for.
Lastly, this production is a wake-up call to both adults and teenagers; sending nudes is never a good idea. The internet is too vulnerable and dangerous for such a risk.
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