Movies are a false representation of a made-up reality. Or are they? Not everything you see on the big (or small) screen is fake. In fact, when it comes to rubbish and London rubbish removal , you will be surprised at how much actors actually have to put up with. Because sometimes the easiest (and admittedly cheapest) way to make a rubbish scene in a movie is to throw the actors among heaps of refuse and hope for the best. Which is precisely what the directors of the movies featured in this article have done.
Star Wars Rubbish Compactor Scene
When George Lucas (a man whose greatest accomplishment thus far had been American Graffiti, which is not exactly the epitome of Sci-Fi classic) set out to make Star Wars, you can probably guess there were a myriad of challenges in the way. Aside from the fact that nobody took him seriously (or maybe because of it), there were constant scheduling and budget problems. This meant they had to improvise. A lot.
Fast forward to the rubbish compactor scene and it’s not too difficult to figure out what sort of props they used. As we’ve already said, the cheapest way to make rubbish props is to not use props at all. Which is precisely what they did. The waste was particularly nasty because there was also water involved the scene. Even though they had water suits under their costumes, Carrie Fisher, Harrison Ford, and Peter Mayhew (who’s noted the stench stayed with the furry suit for a long time) were up to their stomachs in rubbish water. And Mark Hamill actually swam in it… So people shouldn’t get pissed at how much he made for The Force Awakens. Face it, folks – he’s earned that money in advance.
Basically Most of Elysium
When Matt Damon agreed to be cast in Elysium, he probably didn’t know the movie would actually be shot in the world’s second largest rubbish dump. Still, that didn’t stop him from acting the metaphorical crap out of the role (while walking in literal crap, by the way). There were some problems through the shooting process, like half the crew getting sick, despite the fact they were wearing masks. This is definitely one of the films where everyone earned their paychecks, and not just with work.
All of this should come as no surprise. Neill Blomkamp is famous for his social commentary of the not-so-subtle variety and after his low-budget District 9 was a relatively big success, the only logical step was to see a big-budget follow-up from him. The result is a thrilling Sci-Fi adventure that makes you think about social issues. In all fairness, it’s not the “thinking man’s action movie” like The Matrix was back in the day, but you get to see Matt Damon in an exo-skeleton duking it with a South African villain in the middle of a rubbish dump. You can’t say that’s not exciting.
Dumpster Built for Rubbish Scenes in Trash
The sunny beaches of Rio de Janeiro may be a destination for many people, but not everything is sunshine and rainbows in Brazil. Beneath all the luxury and festivals with half-naked women dancing on the streets, there is real poverty in the country. In fact, there are actual children who survive by “picking trash”, living in substandard conditions.
This is what Trash shows us. Well, that’s how it begins, anyway. However, director Stephen Daldry doesn’t go as far as to throw his actors in an actual garbage dump, so one was built for the movie, instead. That doesn’t make it any less real, though. Just more manageable and possibly with fresher rubbish.