Omusajja agwana mukalegga.

This one feels much more like it would have flourished as a series. It has the largest cast I have seen in a single movie. The story is done well and has quite a number of twists and turns. It is effectively about a guy who gets the girl...but gets a ton more than what he bargains for. 

This is a film about duality. A presentation of two practitioners of traditional. The real (one guy who seems to deliver) and the fake (another who simply uses his networks and technology). it also has two women. One content while the other not. It has two men one rich and one seeking to be rich. It is done by Ramon Productions. They have made a name for themselves for being the go to group for Action Sequences. Some have even described the director of these as the Ugandan Quentin Tarantino. 

His films are headquartered in Wakaliga which has become known as Wakaliwood. This crew gave us Who Killed Captain Alex, they also gave us Ani Mulalu (who is really crazy) which went far beyond the usual NGO funded projects about saving the lives of children and awareness raising to an effective local action packed hit. Maybe the film was slightly negative in its portrayal of rich people as kid snatchers but these are the ideas that have filtered through the press. His most recent one talks of collaboration with Dolph Londgren. Another one that Is out is called Million  Dollar Child-about a wiz kid who has developed a tool that helps him control people. It is also described as the Uganda's version of the Expendables (operations kakongolilo).*

*Kakongolilo is a maize cob. 

Ani Mulalu: whose the crazy one?

So we promised you our first review of a Ugandan made movie. Here goes. 

The title to the film is called Ani Mulalu? Which means who is the crazy one. In the local Ganda language you have a play on words that differentiates between "omulalu" and "omugwi we ddalu". This subtle difference is kind of the essence of the movie. It seeks to split between hairs in describing the one who has a moment of insanity and one who really crosses the line. This is the story of the man...a soldier who returns from the his tour of duty and has to deal with the challenge of a kidnapping. We leave it there in order not to ruin the rest of the tale for you. 

The director is called Isaac Nabwana. His work is done under the banner of Ramon Film Productions. From what I gather, there have been quite a number of projects that have been done using the help of multitudes via kick starter. 

There have been previous discussion of this director and his work notably from the BBC (which should be commended for spotlighting not just Uganda's growing film industry but also traveling the continent spotlighting  music from all sorts of genres). 

It is currently too costly to engage specialists who would blow up cars as well as provide stunt doubles so what this director does is make full use of the green screen and a decent set of graphic designers for post editing work. The review from the BBC featured a young American lad who after hearing and seeing some of Isaac's work did what most adventurous Americans do and took a plane to Uganda. Next thing he knows he was assigned a role which had him skipping through puddles of raw...stuff. 

The enthusiastic American described Mr. Nabwana's style as similar to Quentin Tarantino possibly because of the shaky camera style and tendency towards plenty of blood and guts. This could be true. You get the sense at least in his action flick that a wedding is taking place between old school Chinese cinema and Tarantino's no holds barred style of shooting and presentation. 

Personally they had me when the presented their version of camouflage or at least what it would be like to do so in an urban trash filled setting. 

The film was shot to deal with some delicate subject matter after kidnappings increased in the city. We are certain though that they delivered much more than that. The scene on the whole has changed and it has felt at least for me that fact and fiction are harder to split. So In this regard for the whole industry both local and international I hope that we can find some meeting ground. 

The jury is still out regarding the case between voice overs and movie producers as well as resellers of these movies but for those that have a knowledge of the local language there is plenty of overkill. You get the sense that the film would be much better if it were left to exist in the current language even if the voice over guys have a tendency of making it much more enjoyable. Maybe infusing these movies with deliberate voice overs would be a decent proposal and stylistic element all in itself. 

Ramon Film Productions is one to watch if you ask me.