Hollywood, Bollywood, Nollywood….We Love It All Up In ‘Dis Here Hood!

The places that I have lived while abroad haven’t afforded me many avenues for entertainment—except for much heavy drinking. While working as a Peace Corps volunteer in Costa Rica I did my best not to partake in public drinking—as I tried to practice what I preached to the kids I worked with: “You don’t need to drink to have fun!” But it sometimes helped so I only drank when I was away from my home site. When I lived in Botswana, I did the bar scene and weekly “sundowners” with a few colleagues from the UN—where sundowners inevitably turned into “sunrisers.” It took me 3 years to lose the Savannah Dry belly that I acquired while living there and I really don’t want to get it back—so for the last 2 years I’ve pretty much given up drinking except for the occasional glass of wine. In terms of my current forms of entertainment, it is confined to conversations with B and whoever strolls into our yard, harassing my kitten, working out, reading and….watching movies.

When I lived in Malawi there wasn’t much to do either as there weren’t that many nightclubs to frequent in the capital, and basically one decent one in my town of Zomba. But I didn’t want to pay $20 to go, literally, 3 or 4 blocks, as the gas crisis there made prices for taxi rides go out the roof. So within my circle of expat friends we ended up trading movies on our external hard drives. It got to the point that we could actually say, for example, “Oh, this is a Tomoko film” as she was a fan of anything to do with conspiracy theories and anime.
Before living abroad, I used to be pretty stuck up about the films I would watch-I only wanted to watch those films that were Oscar nominated or Indie, or foreign—which, regarding the latter, was elitist to the second power as one Norwegian made evident when he asked me: “Why do Americans call any film that is not produced in Hollywood or the U.S. as foreign, as if American films are primary and everything else is on the fringe? ” “Mmmm because we think we are the best at everything we do and usually we actually are the best?” I was just kidding. But I said it sarcastically, NYC style, so he walked away pretty disgusted with me. But I do have my less snobby side: I love vampire films and sci-fi/fantasy—which mirrors my favorite reading genres. So yes I am a Game of Thrones fan (they are doing a great job adapting the book series)!

But since living in Mozambique I am a movie whore: I will look at anything and everything. Bombed in theaters? Bring it. Didn’t even make it to theater and stayed 2 seconds on a Blockbuster shelf? Bring it harder. I am now a kung fu flick expert from 1975 to present as is every other African person on the continent. Really. I’m not joking or being super American by generalizing and stereotyping. Just look at a tussle on any African street corner—it is all kung fu kicks and karate chops—not one Mike Tyson jab. If you don’t believe me, just drive on by my old town of Zobue, you can pay one metical to sit with about 200 kids on a Saturday afternoon and watch a kung fu film dubbed in Chichewa. I can’t wait until I can find one to copy—I know it will be a classic one day. Not the film—but the fact that it was dubbed in Chichewa.

I feel pretty confident that I have watched most of the trash side of Hollywood since being here, especially horror films: Grave Dancers, Drag Me to Hell and Simon Says. Horror or comedy? I couldn’t stop laughing while watching each one. The Wrong Turn sequels (there must be about 100) who knew films about inbred, cannibalistic hillbillies could be so popular?!? Well, now I know. And did you know that RZA not only acted in a film as the protagonist but also wrote the screenplay to it? And Russell Crowe and Lucy Liu co-starred? I guess they were short on cash and needed to make a payment on something. The Man With the Iron Fists--just in case you missed it.

Of course, most of these films are pirated. The Chinese seem to have cornered the market on perfecting how they copy these films because they look like they are directly from the production company—AND they can fit about 20 films onto one DVD---value for your dollar. Gotta love it! But we still get those films where it is someone sitting in a movie theater and you can hear him coughing and rustling around in his popcorn bag. I’m waiting for the day I can hear him sucking the butter off his fingers as well.

But we don’t discriminate in Maputo. We also watch any film that has come out of Bollywood: the colorful saris, the spontaneous singing and dancing and that for the price of a 2 hour film, we get a film that is 4 hours long. Because we never really know what is happening, we make it up as the film goes along. Which is pretty entertaining. I should note at this point that most Mozambicans in my neighborhood do that anyway when American films are not subtitled in Portuguese. Or on several occasions and much to my annoyance, very loud and heated conversations take place while the movie is playing or even better, someone turns the radio on high. Like, bumpety, bump house party loud. And then they ask me if I can tell them what has happened so far. Really?

And of course there is Nollywood. I watched Bollywood films before, as my family is from a country with a large South Asian population, so they are very popular there too. But it wasn’t until I came to the African continent that my introduction to films from Nigeria was really made. Based on the few I have watched and from what I understood, they usually fit into one of two categories with at least one street scene where someone is confronted in a very loud way and then gets a beat down. One category is the depiction of several intertwined love triangles where some money will have to be paid for dishonoring a wife/sister/family. The second category depicts an evil spirit/devil that has possessed a person and that is why s/he is lesbian or gay. What always confuses me about the latter category is that the point of the film is to condemn homosexuality yet the same-sex love scenes---if not for the large animal print blanket covering them-- is borderline pornographic. So in my opinion, if you are against homosexuality don’t make films that will make people either get their groove on or view it out of curiosity.

We also watch telenovelas, or soap operas, either from Brazil or from Mexico, which are dubbed in Portuguese. Well, I should say B watches them while I am on the internet. But in general, EVERYONE watches telenovelas here—B’s 22 year old brother who lives with us will stop what he is doing with his friends to come home and watch his telenovela---as everyone has their favorite. Since Portuguese culture is strong here, I kind of guessed there would be huge fans of soaps just like when I lived in Central and South America—even down to the youngest child of the family. Once, when I lived in Costa Rica, I was in my room reading when I heard a voice outside my window say “No, no Carlos! It’s enough! I can’t take this anymore! Do you love me? DO you!! Answer me Carlos!!!” When I looked out, it was my landlord’s 4 year old daughter reciting a scene from the telenovela from the night before—and not just using her voice she was doing the facial expressions as well!

I’ve decided not to get into that scene as when I lived in Costa Rica—as it is addictive and they are not like our soap operas where story lines never end and characters reappear even after being decapitated 5 years earlier. If you miss one, then it is hard to catch up and the storyline ends within 3-6 months, so you have to pay attention. We also have something along the line of Univision’s Sabado Gigante—called Programma do GuGu. I love it because it is not so much a variety show as it is about people winning money, home appliances and on some occasions, folks getting a makeover for themselves or their home. I hope that one day I can be part of the in-studio audience for both of these shows. Ok, I just don’t want to sit, clap and sing the show’s theme song. I want to make a fool out of myself winning something awesome in my funky Spanish or Portuguese! But until then it will have to be whatever I can get my hands on, which just may be another awful horror film from 1995.