Sahara: Worst Movie Ever!

I’m not usually in the habit of writing movie reviews, but my friend and I decided to watch the movie Sahara the other day, and we were so offended I felt I had to say something about it. If you’ve never seen it, it stars Matthew McConaughy and Penelope Cruz trying to find a missing ship/ stopping an epidemic outbreak/ some other ridiculousness in Mali. The only problem is that they make up some fictional Mali that has nothing to do with the current situation. In Sahara’s scenario, Mali is run by some reggae-sounding general with dreads, with chaos and strife ruling. Now Mali has a lot of problems going for it, but the one thing they have managed to avoid is falling into the civil-war/ warlord scenario that has plagued many other African nations. I’m not expecting Hollywood to be all politically-correct all of a sudden, but poor Mali barely gets any face time as it is in the world, the least they could do is give it a good rep. True, there are some problems in the north, involving a small rebellion from an ethnic minority population and the presence of Al-Qaeda coming across from Algeria, but overall Mali is a really (really!) peaceful country that has transitioned rather tranquilly from colony to semi-democracy.