I feel like the warning, “Don’t ever mix juju with technology” will be stuck with me for a long time. Thanks, Rain. From the time CJ Obasi’s Hello, Rain started its press cycle, I wanted the short film to be cool. The teaser, released last year, was skeletal and didn’t particularly fill me with anticipation. With a compelling premise – three scientist witches who through a combination of juju and technology create magical wigs that grants them untold powers – the short has now been considerably fleshed out in a trailer – and it looks really promising.
The trailer is shrouded in an air of mystery, though. Like, what can these scientist witches exactly do with their powers? These women – Rain, Philo, and Coco – are the pivotal figures of the story. Coco, when we see her, luxuriates in her narcissism, and a red laser beams out from her eyes. Cool. To recap on what we know, Rain creates this magical wigs and shares them her friends. What we didn’t know is that Philo and Coco were going to get power drunk. As with everything, power corrupts and Rain finds herself in a confrontation with Philo. “Put it back on, Rain” Philo says to Rain towards the end of the trailer. “No Philo. It has turned us to cruel witches.” Rain’s reply is firm.
This metaphor is familiar, striking at heart of the political climate in Africa where African leaders cling to power. Hello Rain is based on the afrofuturistic short story Hello, Moto by World Fantasy, Nebula and Hugo award-winning author Nnedi Okorafor.
Obasi says in a statement that he’s been dying to adapt Okorafor’s work for some time and due to budget, he settled on adapting Hello, Rain into a short film. “I wanted to work on something though small, but a completely different scale and scope from anything I’ve ever done,” he says. “I asked Nnedi if she had any un-optioned short stories, and she old me she did. She sends me a catalogue of short stories, and I read every single one of them. But something about Hello, Moto jumped out to me.”
He continues:
“I also loved that it has three powerful women at the core of its narrative – scientist witches at that. That stuff just intrigues the hell out of me. And then it has these underlining themes on politics, corruption and black women’s hair, and that’s Africa right there. That’s the world.”
Through projects like Hello, Rain, Obasi wants to make African beauty “look cool, fun and sexy.” For him, it’s high time filmmakers project this on the big screen. “I just feel like it’s important that we tell Alternative African stories, and that they become mainstream – we need to inspire this generation and the next to see blackness and humanity in a different and true light.” Obasi says. “These stories might be called speculative fiction and all, but there’s a lot of truth in re-envisioning an alternative African narrative.”
Hello, Rain will have its world premiere at the 2018 International Short Film Festival Oberhausen, Germany (Internationale Kurzfilmtage Oberhausen) on May 6.
When Bernard Dayo isn’t writing about pop culture, he’s watching horror movies and reading comics and trying to pretend his addiction to Netflix isn’t a serious condition.
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