I have come not to bury Eskom, but to praise it

From the makers of “Eskom power alerts: How can we help you“, “Eskom II : This time with solar water heaters” and “Oh Eskom! My Eskom!” comes a Malt Dizzy film, Broke Back Mounting Ladder.

Barry Wrongun sent us this short review :

Arnold Bagel is a typical Johannesburg northern-suburbs businessman (imports/exports … something like that)

One evening late in January 2008 (don’t let me catch anyone sniggering — with these power cuts there may be many who will be “late in January”) he notices that he is experiencing a lot of snow on his television. Being a Jewish handyman (like army intelligence) he decides to get up on the roof and adjust his aerial.

Halfway up the ladder leaning against the side of his house he suffers a cruel twist of fate — Sam Mlambo of Meadowlands turns on his electric razor at the same time as John Mullins in Parow switches on his kettle, thereby blowing the national grid, which simply can’t cope with this additional pressure.

Why people have to abuse electricity like this is beyond me.

Needless to say, Bagel, now in the dark, misses his footing and crashes to the ground, severely injuring his back. The Bagels are in a pickle, what with the loss of their breadwinner (not to mention the price of bread, as it is) and no clear indication from Eskom of when they can expect enough light to retrieve Arnold.

In a desperate effort to save her husband, Britney Bagel contacts Eskom, which advises her that the fault lies with the Department of Minerals and Energy, and that it is load-shedding. It tells her to ensure that she gets a copy of Eskom’s Guide to Not Undertaking Any Business Projects for the Foreseeable Future; a preview of the World Cup 2010, now in Germany; Eskom’s top 10 funniest home videos, including “Digging up the Gautrain workers”; and the hit song Cremations: Never on a Sunday (or any days with a “Y” in the title).

In desperation she grabs a torch and goes looking for her husband in the rain (you seen clear sky yet?). She advises 50 Cents, her oldest son, to find out which hospitals have a generator so she can take dad for treatment.

The rest of the movie is hilarious as she gridlocks in Glenhazel for two hours only to get to a single traffic light that works in Sandringham to find that there is a gridlock 12 blocks long — the metro police figure that motorists love being checked in a roadblock for a couple of hours after being gridlocked for more hours by the robots not working.

One of the touching moments in the movie is when Britney asks the metros (numbering 400) why they can’t get pointsmen to broken robots if they can spare 400 for a roadblock.

How the magistrate laughs when the metros relate the story at Britney’s bail hearing the following morning.

But I’ve given away enough of the movie — it’s a not-to-be-missed rating for this one.

Have a lufferly day, Gautengers.