Comments on: District 9 (2009)

By: rjschwarz

rjschwarz — Wed, 20 Jan 2010 04:24:18 +0000

I felt the prawns were far more realistic aliens than those in the flick Avatar. Yeah the Na’vi breathed air poisonous to humans and were extra tall but beyond that they were kind of idealized humans with culture hobbled together from different identifiable human sources. The Prawns on the other hand, well they were alien. We still don’t know much about them. Seeing as they were workers any vestige of their normal society was probably impossibly gimped before they arrived.

Oh, and I felt the Documentary footage made everything feel far more real than the 3d of Avatar.

I just wish he’d hacked 30 minutes or so out of the middle of District 9 and kept more of the documentary format.

By: rjschwarz

rjschwarz — Wed, 20 Jan 2010 04:20:43 +0000

I’d assumed Christopher was one of the alien leaders and the ship beneath his shanty was the command module that fell from the ship. Since his hovel had a gang sign on it he was some kind of leader, and since nobody turned him in as the leader I’d guessed the Prawns were far more organized than the Earthlings realized.

What I didn’t get was the insinuation that Prawns would find human prostitutes appealing and then the sudden reversal that Wikus was infected by sex with prawns.

I hated the evil corporation bit. Its old hat and lazy, and the DNA to fire the weapons was a bit lame. Still when those alien weapons fired it was pretty awesome and original.

By: Alan

Alan — Mon, 04 Jan 2010 19:39:30 +0000

I liked the movie. As a South African I understood some of the subtleties that may have been missed by those foreign to the region.

South Africa has 11 languages, people often converse in their mother tongue and can understand another’s language without having to speak it. I grew up watching Afrikaans television, understood the language, but could not speak Afrikaans – so the language issue between prawns and humans is a non issue.

As for Wikus, I knew guys like this, the everyman, not-so-smart-wannabe good guy. He thinks he is diligent in his job and takes himself seriously.

Yes, there is a reference to apartheid, however there is also a strong reference to the huge influx of ‘illegal aliens’ to South Africa coming in from north of the border. When the people in the street talk about the prawns, you could replace that with Zimbabweans, Nigerians etc. And yes, your cell phone or shoes can and do get stolen by these ‘aliens’. That was some subtle tongue in cheek humor on the directors part.

This is more than a science fiction movie, it is a commentary on us as humans, and how we treat each other, how we see foreigners in our country, that we may have some redeeming qualities, but generally we are a sick bunch :)

As to the infection by the fuel, easy answer, the aliens use genetic technology for the guns and their fuel – The alien genetics in the fuel infected Wikus. MNU I think is a parody of the UN, hence the white vehicles crossed with armscor/dennel the SA arms manufacturer – Multi National Unit – funny in a way!

The premise is in reality not all that believable, I am sure we would treat aliens a lot better. this is a movie, it is far fetched, it is a story. In real life, we usually treat our ‘human aliens’ with such contempt and disrespect – much like in the movie ….

A thought provoking movie, one which I enjoyed immensely.

This was the old new south africa, with no Mandela as protagonist :)

By: Rick Popko

Rick Popko — Mon, 07 Dec 2009 22:11:42 +0000

I thought D9 was a decent film, but the thing that ruined it for me was the shift on POV. I loved the intro documentary approach, but somewhere in the middle of the film they chucked that out the window in favor of a straight-up narrative. The movie never fully recovered for me after that.

By: Nathan Shumate

Nathan Shumate — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 16:58:36 +0000

My fingers simply can’t keep up with my supersonic brain.

By: sandra

sandra — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 16:16:21 +0000

There are a couple of words missing in the first paragraph: “the contrast between sight and sound would not have prompted the amazed reaction that it (did). (Had) District 9 …” Interestingly, although D9 is a South African film, the special effects were done here in Vancouver B.C. Canada, since you can get champagne effects on a beer budget here. Thirty million dollars being a small budget these days, apparently.

By: Prankster

Prankster — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 06:03:32 +0000

The stuff about the absence of leadership and Christopher evolving to fill that role comes from interviews with Blomkamp rather than “fanwank”, but yes, it would have been nice to have that clarified a little more in the movie itself. But I do think it’s clear that the prawns have adopted human personalities as a result of having been around humans for so long–they apparently started out as essentially mindless, and have slowly been changing in response to a social vacuum, so it more or less makes sense that a drone culture would shape itself to look like the nearest model.

(SPOILERS)

And yeah, that “rocket fuel causes alien transformation” bit is headsmackingly dumb and seriously damages the film. Talk about phlebotinum. I’ll tell you what my first thought was, on seeing that plot point: I thought that Christopher was trying to scrape together the alien equivalent of royal jelly and breed a new queen/general/brain bug/whatever. That would have made Wikus’s transformation make a whole lot more sense, and would even have been thematically powerful–he could have become sort of a messiah figure and helped bridge the gap between the two cultures.

Random side note: the name “van der Merwe” is apparently a punchline in South Africa, the butt of a series of jokes. It’s sort of like if an American director ha called his lead characters “Goofus” and “Gallant” or “Mutt” and “Jeff”.

By: Nathan Shumate

Nathan Shumate — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 17:23:55 +0000

I really don’t see how a sequel could be any good; it would basically be a rehash of Conquest of the Planet of the Apes with mecha suits. I’m happy to be proven wrong, of course.

By: Liam

Liam — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 16:34:38 +0000

Granted, I must admit after I was out of the theater and my mind began to clear from the fast-paced, top-notch executed action sequences I also thought “That’s a highly contrived plot, actually.”

Making things worse was the appearance of ye olde sci-fi trope “human protagonist turns into alien”… Yeah, I get it, we may look different, but aside from that we’re alike and yadda yadda. (By the way, isn’t it somewhat nonsensical that rocket fuel is supposed to be capable of something like that?) There was a scene with a throw-away line stating the relocation is overseen by UN forces (apparently consisting of just five men), but one has to wonder what nation in existance would give a private company charge over an entire community of aliens. Even if they’re indeed just unskilled worker “drones” lacking intricate knowledge of the exact scientific principals their technology is based on, I’m quite sure the world powers in the middle of the Cold War would had seized as much as possible in the hope to get at least some useful information from them, Operation Paperclip style.

On the other hand, Wikus driving (wearing?) a heavily armed mecha to fight a whole squad of mercs made one almost forget this. Let’s hope the sequel will be an equally good film.

By: Nathan Shumate

Nathan Shumate — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 13:07:17 +0000

Or something. And if his personality/role were in a state of flux, his constant exposure to humans for two decades might have made him especially humanlike in his attitudes (as seen in his relationship with his son).

I have to tell you, it always makes me uneasy when fans have to add a lot of “scaffolding” to make something work.