Nigerians Glow In Ben Omalu’s Concussion

WILL Smith’s first scene in his latest movie, Concussion, will make any Nigerian glow with pride. Playing Doctor Bennet Omalu, the Nigerian-born forensic pathologist, who incidentally discovered a disease entity termed, ‘Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy (CTE)’, Smith’s Omalu, sporting a wobbly accent and an everyman’s self-effacement, serves as an expert witness in a trial and establishes his thing for hands.

The hands say it all for Dr Omalu as he comes to demonstrate with style. But before that, Omalu attempts to convince the court of his expertise and gives an oral reading of his qualifications. He starts by listing the University of Nigeria, Nsukka as his alma mater before going on to humble brag about other post graduate achievements: Masters degrees, fellowship awards, diplomas etc. But the building blocks for this modern day American hero were raised in a sleepy town in the Eastern state of Enugu.

Before Smith took on the role of Omalu, few Americans and even fewer Nigerians had heard of the good doctor.

It is the year 2002 and aside from performing as an expert witness in trials across the country, Omalu works in the Allegheny County, Pennsylvania coroner’s office where he spends more time than is allocated working on cadavers. In Hollywood iterations, that’s always a good thing, a sign of a hard, dedicated worker; but for colleagues of such workaholics and a system dealing with chronic underfunding, they constitute a nuisance. Omalu faces hostility in the form of Daniel Sullivan, a co-worker played by Mike O’Malley but he earns an ally and mentor in Doctor Cyril Wecht (a prickly Albert Brooks).

While working on the remains of Mike Webster, a football hero, Omalu discovers some form of progressive degeneration in the brain that doesn’t fit with Alzheimer’s, the disease condition under which Webster’s condition was expected to be classified. Curious about his strange findings, Omalu keeps digging, calling on his entire medical and research knowledge and enlisting help from other experts. He links his post mortem findings to repeated trauma from the physical sport of football, and with the help of his colleagues, goes on to publish a landmark, much reviewed paper.

The big bad National Football League (NFL) is cast as the villain here, and like many movie cases of institutional villainy, no one person is held responsible. The full weight of the powerful institution descends upon Omalu. His entire career is called to question, as he is barred from being physically present at a pivotal presentation while his wife, Prema (Gugu Mbatha-Raw), is stalked and his allies are hounded with corruption charges. But Omalu perseveres, forcing the NFL to a showdown by taking his findings public.