The Fisherman’s Diary is a true life story about a girl, Ekah, whose determination to go to school sends her down a painful path because her father doesn’t believe in education and in the town she lives in, girl education is a taboo.
While watching the movie, I felt like I was reading a book, with each page pulling me in, and making me feel different emotions, making me go through and understand everything Ekah went through.
Though it is based on a true story, the dramatisation was nothing short of captivating. If there’s ever a reference to how a story should take you through a character’s journey from beginning to the end – every emotion, every joy, laughter, determination, pain, etc., – then Fisherman’s Diary is one of the best representations of it.
Faith Fidel (Ekah) was more than superb, and she brought a new standard to what it means to be a child actor with a very bright future ahead of her. Her acting was beautiful and to say she did justice to the role seems like an oversimplification. Other cast members also did justice to their roles.
The direction captured the struggle, poverty, and pain in a way that almost made you see a certain level of beauty in what still plagues many countries in the world.
It’s a unique movie that portrays many societal and gender-based injustices for the girl child (rape, child bride, ban on education, etc.,) which is rampant in not just Cameroon, but many parts of Africa including Nigeria.
If there is anything to warn you about, it is the pacing of the movie. It has the same pacing as TV shows like Breaking Bad and Narcos: Mexico, but like the aforementioned TV shows, if you stick around to the end, then you are in for one amazing/bittersweet experience.
Is Fisherman’s Diary worth watching? Yes, it is. A painful journey and memory with a happy ending that leaves you biting back tears.