Rural biblical plague disturbs Snakes On A Plane

It was supposed to be a day of cultural triumph for tongue-in-cheek movie ‘Snakes On A Plane’. Instead Samuel L. Jackson and his co-stars took a back seat to another soaraway tabloid hit… the story of an alleged “biblical plague” in picturesque Wiltshire.

Millions of flies have descended on the peaceful villages of Collingbourne Ducis and Collingbourne Kingston on the edge of Salisbury Plain, causing massive inconvenience to locals and puzzlement to environmental health inspectors.

Residents say they have had to sweep away piles of dead flies every morning since late July 2006. Local shops have sold out of insect repellents.

The villages also suffered invasions of house flies in 2001 and 2003, but this summer’s is said to be the worst, according to The Times newspaper.

The swarms, described (somewhat inaccurately, note theologians) as “a plague of biblical proportions”, have so far not yielded to the intervention of swot teams.

Indeed, thanks to TV and press coverage they have spread internationally – with fly images and stories denying ‘Snakes On A Plane’ precious column inches.

While described by Flick Philosopher’s MaryAnn Johanson as “very much in the tradition of that genre of socially aware, psychologically insightful films of the 1960s that Truffaut called cinema du serpent”, ‘Snakes On A Plane’ is, to David Cornelius, simply “the ultimate B movie”.

According to 7M Pictures’ Kevin Carr, it “throws every known cliché at you in the course of 100 minutes, but this works to the film’s advantage.”

Parodying the genre of disaster movies, the cult-before-its-release Hollywood hit revolves around an FBI agent escorting an eyewitness on a flight to justice, while a crime lord tries to eliminate him by unleashing a deadly surprise on the commercial flight.

Up and down the country today, filmgoers were eagerly anticipating just what this surprise might be, and tenaciously ignoring subtle clues in the title.

The media was denied the possibility of a pre-release screening of Snakes On A Plane, but a naturalist and plague expert told Ekklesia that the natural solution for both filmgoers and Wiltshire residents was to put the two phenomena together.

He explained: “Send Salisbury Plain’s environmental health professionals on to that plane to get the snakes off so that they can eat the flies. That way both annoyed villagers and terrified airline passengers can regain control of their lives.”

An associate of stars Samuel L Jackson and Kenan Thomspon said: “We appreciate the suggestion, but it would kind of detract from the point of our artistic venture.”

Meanwhile, Wiltshire residents are said to be “less than cheered” by the discovery that an American Jewish website offers “fun activities” to “enable the ten plagues to be re-enacted” before Passover.

To represent the flies “use clear scotch tape to tape pepper or small ‘dots’ … in different areas of the house, the windows, the bathroom mirrors, etc”, it helpfully suggests.

The Egyptian plague stories are recorded in chapters 7-12 of the book of Exodus, recounting the way an oppressive Pharaoh was forced to release Moses and the Israelite slaves.

No snakes were handled in the writing of this story.