Goona-goona epic

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'Goona-goona epic' refers to any of several films set in the Far East or Southeast Asia which combined travelogue and stock footage of exotic customs and locales with universally understandable stories of romance and betrayal. Nudity and sexual situations were important to these films. In Hollywood trade magazines "goona-goona" was a descriptive word for films or photos showing women of color with bare breasts,[1] usually in a supposed spirit of ethnographic interest like National Geographic.

The word goona-goona comes from the 1932 film Goona-Goona, An Authentic Melodrama of the Island of Bali by Andre Roosevelt and Armand Denis.[2] Supposedly "goona-goona" is an aphrodisiac or "love powder" made from a narcotic plant. In Indonesian, the word actually means a type of evil magic[3] or a love spell cast upon an unwilling victim.[4]

The word is used rarely today to mean sexually charged feelings or situations.

Notable Goona-Goona Motion Pictures

2

References

  1. ^ Fatimah Tobing Rony, The third eye: race, cinema, and ethnographic spectacle, p. 145 et seq.
  2. ^ Goona-Goona, An Authentic Melodrama of the Island of Bali TCM.com website describing the film.
  3. ^ Rony, p. 148.
  4. ^ Unni Wikan, Managing Turbulent Hearts, A Balinese Formula for Living (University of Chicago Press, 1990).