KAMPALA: It’s a searing hot day, and a group of commandos are attempting a daring prison break.

“Stop, get them!” General Placdo, an invincible Kung Fu master in khaki fatigues, shouts in the local Luganda language.

“You will never succeed, we will destroy the world! You will see!” screams a recurring villain in a black balaclava, who is the leader of the Tiger Mafia, before a fistfight ensues.

This is no real-life jailbreak, rather a scene from “Operation Kakongoliro” (“Ugandan Expendables“), an action film due for release later this year. It is being filmed in a scrap yard in Wakaliga, a slum in Uganda’s capital Kampala now named as “Wakaliwood.”

“It is going to be as big as Nollywood, Bollywood or even Hollywood — there’s no reason why not,” writer, director, editor and producer Isaac Nabwana boasted of Uganda’s informal film industry — boldly insisting studios in Nigeria, India and the United States will get a run for their money.

“We think Hollywood people will come here,” he said.

Raised by his grandparents in Wakaliga, which today has a population of just under 2,000 people, Nabwana’s family didn’t buy a television until 1984.

Before that Nabwana would listen to descriptions of the movies watched by his older brothers at local video halls, the shacks where the majority of Ugandans still watch movies in local languages.

“They would tell you and I would imagine what was in that movie,” Nabwana told AFP.