So, Ottawa does know how to have fun
Kontinuum, La Machine are bold ideas in a city not renowned for creativity
You may remember me from such columns as: The Rideau Canal is overrated; Elgin Street is too trendy these days to be fun; and, Why are the fun police killing the Prince of Wales bridge?
Oh – and Beavertails are still not for me.
All true. And yet, now and again, there are flashes of inspiration. Hundreds of thousands of people came out to see the duelling La Machine creatures over the weekend. (Awesome though it was, Sunday night’s finale featured poorly managed crowd control – we were shouted at to move in order to avoid imminent trampling-by-dragon – and the show dragged on for an unnecessary hour or so. It’s not clear it had to be like that.)
Better, in my mind, is the Kontinuum light show, put on by Montreal’s Moment Factory, and which rang in at a cost of about $4 million.
It’s ambitious, it’s exciting, the technology that went into it – this isn’t my area of expertise – is futuristic and impressive.
In short, it’s the sort of attraction that a bold city would try to have, not just as a tourist draw, but to drum up excitement among those of us who live here. That Ottawa has pulled it off is cause for celebration.
After the unpleasant-andarguably-a-disaster on Canada Day, it really is nice to see something great happen in Ottawa. More than that, though, Kontinuum brings you to Sparks Street, which, as pretty much everyone has been saying for ages, has badly needed resuscitation.
(And, yeah, it is way better than the light show on Parliament Hill – though I’d suggest timing it right and making an evening of both, stopping by Sparks for a post-light-show cocktail and snack.)
Fundamentally, Kontinuum works because walking through a subterranean LRT station months before it opens is just plain cool.
It would be cool even without the light show, honestly. When I went, you could still see the bits and pieces from the workers who normally inhabit the joint – piles of coffee cups, for example. You could write this off as sloppy garbage in an otherwise marquee production, but the detritus of construction and everyday life actually added quite a bit to my trip through the tunnels.
As for the light show, the effects are well executed, and it has an eerie funhouse feel without being actually scary. The highlight, for me, were the light bars that made different noises when you walked through them. But also great is the body scan that projects your digital self onto a screen at the end (and, look carefully: you might see yourself riding the train once you descend to the tracks).
Also fun: When you come above ground again, you’ve travelled several blocks through downtown Ottawa.
This sort of subterranean travel is, well, perfectly normal in cities that actually have real transit infrastructure, but is new and exciting in Ottawa and vaguely disorienting – unless you consider Barbarella’s Cabaret a landmark downtown that helps you get your bearings.
Hopefully, everyone who’ll be able to see it will get in before all the visiting slots fill up, and before it closes on Sept. 14. But it really is worth seeing; I’m no expert in kids or what they like, but I suspect it’s worth dragging them in from the Glebe or Orléans or Kanata or South Keys to check it out.
Of course, I don’t want to oversell it. Hype can wreck a great thing, that’s for sure.
Whatever you end up thinking about the show, though, one thing is for certain: This was a bold idea in a city not renowned for being bold. I’m glad it happened – and even if it’s a flop for some, it’s an exciting attempt.
Sometimes, that’s all you can ask for.