WAKALIGA, Uganda (AP) – Deep in a Kampala slum, young men kick each other while a stout man with a salt-and-pepper beard watches them, sometimes nodding in approval.
With luck, a stylish blow could become a stunt in the latest action movie to emerge from this tin-roofed collection of houses known as Wakaliwood, named after this Wakaliga neighborhood.
Here is the engine of Uganda’s tiny film industry, the source of $200-budget movies and a glimmer of fame. Later this month, the Wakaliwood film “Bad Black” premieres at Fantastic Fest, which calls itself the largest genre film festival in the United States.
Its organizers call the film an “exuberant DIY extravaganza” from an industry whose “reckless abandon manages to inspire more heart, grit and soul than a thousand Hollywood blockbusters.”
“I love that this is a cinema born out of a community of film lovers,” said Peter Kuplowsky, a programming director who also has screened Wakaliwood films in Toronto. He likes Uganda’s practice of watching films with live commentary by “video jokers” who help make plots more relatable.