Children are being kidnapped and killed for the magical properties their blood is believed to contain. Two fathers, one of whom has been driven crazy from the loss of both his wife and daughter, and the other of which who believes his son is still alive, join together in an attempt at rescue and/or revenge. At the same time, the kidnapped children are planning their escape.

A film by IGG Nabwana

Uganda, 2019, fiction, 63 minutes, Luganda / English | 14A

starring Dauda Bisaso, Kirabo Beatrice, Alex Ssemwogerere, Charles Bukenya, Isaac Newton

Tags:
Midnight Madness / TIFF'19 / Martial Arts / Comedy / Life Experiences / Sub-Saharan African


NOTE BY THE PROGRAMMER
In the latest from Uganda's gonzo action auteur IGG Nabwana, a gang of child-snatching mobsters make a fatal mistake when they kidnap the Waka Stars, a team of pint-sized kung-fu masters who soon turn their cunning wits and deadly skills upon their captors.

For the past decade, IGG Nabwana and his crack team of fearless filmmakers and martial artists in the slums of Kampala, Uganda, have steadily produced dozens of exhilarating gonzo action films as part of an inspiring creative movement known as Wakaliwood. With their meagre resources buoyed by an exuberant ingenuity, these self-consciously scrappy epics chronicle domestic scandals and adversities ripped straight from the local headlines with brash exploitation-filmmaking gusto.

Conceived by Nabwana as a pre-emptive measure to discourage the kidnapping of his own children (seriously), Crazy World opens with the notorious Tiger Mafia (a frequent Wakaliwood antagonist) embarking on a child-abduction spree. Intending to sacrifice children in a misguided belief that their blood contains magical properties, the criminals make a crucial mistake when they snatch the WAKA STARS, Uganda's pint-sized kung-fu masters. Before long, these badass brats start applying their martial-arts prowess and cunning wits to escape their captors, while their desperate parents commence a rescue/revenge mission of their own.

Originally produced in 2014, Crazy World is the third Wakaliwood feature to be translated for an international release following Who Killed Captain Alex? and Bad Black, both of which earned accolades and awards at international film festivals around the globe. Per a Ugandan oral tradition, every outrageous moment is both contextualized and accentuated by the acerbic wit of an offscreen narrator or "video joker," who at one point exclaims: "BEST KIDZ MOVIE EVAH!" He is not wrong. Welcome to Wakaliwood.

PETER KUPLOWSKY (TIFF 2019, Toronto)

Producers
IGG Nabwana, Alan Ssali Hofmanis

Director
IGG Nabwana

Screenplay
IGG Nabwana

Cinematography
IGG Nabwana

Editing
IGG Nabwana, Alan Ssali Hofmanis

Production Designer
Dauda Bisaso

Sound
IGG Nabwana

Production Companies
Wakaliwood,
Ramon Film Productions


2019 | TIFF, Toronto, Canada
* WORLD PREMIERE
* Closing Night Film, Midnight Madness
www.tiff.net/events/crazy-world