Recently, I watched an excellent Dominican comedy entitled “Tuberculo Presidente.” It’s only available in Spanish to my knowledge, so if you are interested in watching it, you’ll have to adjust your closed captioning. But I feel that it is worth it. It’s a foreign film that’s low on budget, but high on laughs.
The Plot
Two poor Dominicans become the President and Vice-President of their country. They’re placed in this position to do the bidding of corrupt politicians that are trying to insert a controversial pipeline in the national forest. The poor Dominicans arrive at the Presidential Palace and bring their backward habits with them: they hang laundry from the rails, bring a goat into the facility, etc. It’s funny stuff.
Some of these gags are inside jokes, relating to Dominican culture. However, the humor is still broad enough to relate to a wider audience. It’s the haughty politician vs. the humble plebian – a scenario that has been seen many times, but it works well in this context.
Positives
There’s a lot of food humor in the movie. It reminded of Jim Gaffigan, with many jokes relating to eating, portion size, etc. The President believes that if everybody is well fed, the country will be a better place. So he gives food to the local gangsters, poor villagers, etc. The Dominican Republic becomes a magical place, all due to the perfect simplicity of his logic.
What’s great about the movie is what’s missing – the subversive agenda of Hollywood. For example, we don’t have the standard display of feminism (i.e. a scene where a 100 lb. woman beats up 20 men). Also, we don’t have racial division; even though the cast is black and white, the producers are not obsessed with the topic. We see people of different races behaving like they do everyday – without hatred for one another.
It’s refreshing to see a movie like this. It shows that when directors try to tell a story – instead of promoting Cultural Marxism – that magical things can happen.
See a link to the trailer here: Tuberculo Presidente
Major Styles 