GODS MUST BE CRAZY, THE

(director/writer: Jamie Uys; cinematographer: Robert Lewis, Buster Reynolds, Jamie Uys; editor: Jamie Uys; music: John Boshoff; cast: N!xau (Xi), Marius Weyers (Andrew Steyn), Sandra Prinsloo (Kate Thompson), Nic de Jager (Jack Hind), Louw Verwey (Samuel Boga), Michael Thys (Mpudi); Runtime: 108; MPAA Rating: PG; producer: Jamie Uys; 20th Century Fox; 1980-South Africa/Botswana-in English, Afrikaans, Ungwatsi)

“It became a surprise hit in America.”

Reviewed by Dennis Schwartz

The South African writer/director Jamie Uys (“Funny People”/”Animals are beautiful people”) presents this charming but clumsily made offbeat farce that pokes fun at Black culture without any intent of malice. It became a surprise hit in America.

A Coca-Cola bottle falls unbroken from an airplane and a Kalahari desert bushman, N!xau (Xi, a real-life bushman), is sent by his tribe to civilization to return the gift from the heavens to the gods and thereby get rid of it.

It evokes culture clashes, political satire, slapstick comedy and mimics the stereotyped ways Blacks were treated in early Hollywood films.

The physical comedy was loaded with morally incomprehensible gags. But many viewers found this film hilarious.

It mockingly leaves us believing maybe there was no such thing as apartheid, as it creates a fictional country called “Botswana.” It’s an idyllic place where whites and childlike Blacks live in harmony, and everyone in the country fights off the Cuban-sponsored guerrillas trying to destroy their country’s democracy.

The comical antics of Marius Weyers’ bumbling zoologist and Sandra Prinsloo’s school teacher add value to the satire.
 





REVIEWED ON 9/10/2023 GRADE: B-