Wednesday 23 March 2011

Infrared Tunisia II: Monastir

Monastir has two things. The Habib Bourguiba Mausoleum (above) and the Ribat (below). And lots of people and so forth, who live their lives; but they aren't things.

And there's an abandoned car park just up the coast:

So, three things. Monastir has three things. The Habib Bourghiba Mausoleum and the Ribat and an abandoned car park just up the coast. And a beach. An airport, but not for much longer. Amongst its many things etc.

The Ribat is a popular filming location. It has several different bits, you can't see any of the surrounding buildings when you're inside it, and with some creative camerawork you could turn it into an entire city. The last time you saw the following view it had ROMANI ITE DOMUM written all over it:

If only I had pressed the button a split-second earlier. I'm tempted to edit it so that the cat is just to the left, but it would be tricky to get the pattern to match. I'm also tempted to call the shot Stray Cat Infra-Blues but (a) it might not be a stray cat and (b) it would be a godawful name. And it would be technically misleading; infra-blue is green.

If there's one thing I've learned from Monty Python it's that whimsy needs a solid grounding in hard fact in order to work. That's what separated the Pythons from Spike Milligan. His brand of whimsy was just a lot of made-up nonsense that relied on shock effect to deliver its comedy payload. There was no second strike. In contrast, the Pythons prepped the target with ECM, Wild Weasel support, and once the bombs had gone in they had sufficient resources to bounce the rubble; they were operating in a different league.