On the surface, The Gods Must Be Crazy is about a Bushman who finds an empty Coke bottle.  However, South African filmmaker Jamie Uys - who wrote, directed, and produced - has more on his agenda than soft drinks or a mere fish-out-of-water comedy.  Skillfully intertwining Xixo's plight with two other story lines, Uys satirizes Western culture and suggests technology alone does not make a person civilized.

Xixo (N!xa) encounters the "heavenly gift" while hunting in the Kalahari Desert and takes it home where he and his kinsmen devise many uses for it.  But the bottle's uniqueness soon eclipses its utility, as it becomes a commodity worth fighting for.  To restore peace, the hapless bushman leaves his tribal lands to return the object to the gods.  In his travels he encounters several strange people, none of whom speak his sophisticated language of clicking sounds.

Kate Thompson (Sandra Prinsloo) has quit her mundane office job in the city to become a schoolteacher in a remote village...if she can get there.  Her guide, Andrew Steyn (Marius Weyers), is a brilliant researcher, but when he's around Kate, he becomes an inept klutz.  The final player is would-be revolutionary Sam Boga (Louw Verwey), who flees to the desert on the lam from the authorities.

How all this ends is not quite a mystery, but several scriptural concepts come into play: the kinsman-redeemer, looking beyond appearances, and the underdog triumphing over a powerful foe.  Ultimately, Xixo, Kate, Andrew, and Sam all get what they want or at least what they deserve.  And the audience gets a rare treat-a thoroughly original, engaging comedy.

Film essay by Dr. Thom Parham

Discussion Panelists:  Leilani Downer, Terry Fouche, Larry Rich

The Gods Must Be Crazy Screening
Saturday, November 11 6:30pm
Panel Discussion Follows