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With its social commentary and existential angst 'District 9' is certainly not your typical alien invasion flick in which plotline is secondary to special effects. Who knew a sci-fi thriller could actually have a heart?
District 9 is the antidote to the cynical, CGI-obsessed, P.T. Barnum-esque schlock that passes for sci-fi filmmaking these days, films in which people and plot matter little in the service of razzle-dazzle special effects and things that go boom in the night. (Yes, Michael Bay, I’m talking to you. Go forth and “Transform” no more.) It is savagely satirical, yes, sparing no one while sending up xenophobia, the military industrial complex and humankind’s baser instincts. But beneath all that existential angst pulses a surprisingly tender—and hopeful—heart.
It’s also a hell of a lot of fun.
You could make the argument that in lesser, American hands, District 9 would look very, very different. It’s the difference between, say, Stephen Sommers’ G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra and Alfonso Cuarón’s Children of Men, between Bay’s Armageddon and Duncan Jones’ Moon. But District 9 is written and directed by South African filmmaker Neill Blomkamp, and produced by seminal New Zealander Peter Jackson, he of The Lord of the Rings blockbusters. There is a different sensibility at work here, and a most welcome one at that.
District 9 starts out mockumentary style, with a simple premise: A couple of decades back, aliens from outer space arrived in a massive mother ship and … just hung out for three months, hovering above Johannesburg. No beatific beings stepped down to great the humanoids, a la Close Encounters. Nor did evil aliens demonstrate intentions to kick some human ass a la Mars Attack and Independence Day. (Though it must be said, the District 9 spaceship looks a lot like the one in Will Smith’s flick, a deliberate move, we are sure, on Blomkamp’s part.)
Finally, some brave souls fly up to the spaceship and open it up, only to discover, not “music from heaven and bright shining lights,” as one witness puts it, but a horror show of malnourished, badly frightened aliens cowering in the dark. One million of them. It is a fleeting, yet powerful image, one conjuring visions of the hull of a slave ship post Middle Passage. (As well as boat people and the undocumented crammed into the trunks of cars, crossing the U.S./Mexican border.) The aliens, now refugees, are moved to a temporary camp, dubbed District 9. Whereupon they quickly wear out their welcome.
These aliens, derisively dubbed “prawns,” or bottom feeders, are far from the cuddly creature that inhabited E.T. Rather, they are human-sized, garbage-eating roaches for whom canned cat food is their crack. They will do anything for cat food, including selling their considerable cache of weapons to a greedy band of Nigerian gangsters who’ve set up camp in the alien townships. They are feral and ferocious, speaking in a weird, clicking language. (A language that references that of the South African Xhosas, immortalized in Miriam Makeba’s “Click Song.”) No one likes them: Black South Africans take to the streets, demanding that the aliens be removed: “At least they’re keeping them separate from us,” a black South African declares without irony in a classic case of N.I.M.B.Y. (Not In My Backyard).
Something must be done. And that something turns out to be an intergovernmental program (the “Multinational Union”) to move the aliens from their current township to District 10—a camp far, far from the madding crowd. (The film is influenced by South Africa’s real-life, apartheid-era District 6 in Capetown, where its inhabitants were forcibly removed during the 1970s.) Heading up the eviction program is Wikus Van De Merwe (Sharlto Copley, in a breakout role), a cheerfully clueless naïf with a lethal dark side. Wikus sets out to evacuate the prawns with all deliberate speed, irrevocably changing his life course—and that of everyone around him, human and alien—in the process.
Yes, you are meant to think about apartheid (Wikus and his superiors are clearly Afrikaner), and perhaps the Trail of Tears, too. You are also meant to feel discomfited: The Nigerians are violent and venal, practicing witchcraft and alien cannibalism. You could holler racial stereotyping, but are the Nigerians here any worse than the white South Africans gleefully blowing up prawns and conducting medical experiments on the survivors? There is a pervasive sense of doom and urgency surrounding District 9, but somehow it never feels heavy-handed.
This is a tricky thing to accomplish, but somehow, Blomkamp manages to do this, mixing action-packed drama with humor and social commentary, while exploring the limits of love, both romantic and parental. The filmmakers aren’t afraid to play with technology—and one of the aliens looks a lot like the robotic critters in the Transformers flicks—but here, the whiz-bang stuff is used in service to the plot and not the other way around.
It’s hard to make good sci-fi these days. And District 9 succeeds where others have failed because it refuses to rely on trickery to tell its story. And note: It has a story to tell. Yes, lots of things go boom, and yes, lots of body parts go flying, but District 9 never veers from the basics: Introduce a classically conflicted hero, riddled with flaws and driven by a powerful motivation. Throw in lots of obstacles along the way, including antiheroes hell-bent on doing him in. Throw in themes that speak to larger truths. Create a dystopia not too far from present-day reality. Layer on humor, wisecracks and a smattering (not too much) of pathos. Pile on nuance. Keep the audience guessing.
And guess they will: There is no predictable ending here, only open-ended possibilities that filmgoers will relish in unraveling long after the final credits have rolled to a stop. Will there be a District 10? Perhaps. Perhaps not. But one can hope.
Teresa Wiltz is The Root's senior culture writer.
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There is a different sensibility at work here, and a most welcome one at that. online games
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Abuja — Sam Onimisi, National Secretary, Democratic Peoples Alliance, DPA, thinks that there is no reason for celebration; that rather it should be a period for sober reflection by Nigerians and the leaders of the country. He said there is nothing sustainable that would call for celebration because most of the expectations of Nigerians have not been met as expected of a nation like Nigeria.
He said that since after the colonial rule, most of the past and present leaders of Nigeria have failed to work in the interest of the people by sincerely meeting the earnest desires of Nigerians. "I will say that there is practically nothing to celebrate for this past 49years of the existence of this nation, because Nigerian leaders seem to have specialized in putting the cart before the horse and so we have not succeeded in getting our priorities right.
"After 49years of existence, Nigeria cannot boast of being a nation. Nigeria is still just a country, we are not united, but our leaders are pretending that we are, we are not developing, but our leaders are shouting that we are. We are not growing apart from natural growth, like population growth, but they are saying that we are growing and yet we see other smaller nations which are not as old as Nigeria, getting ahead of us in various areas of development, we are not developing and we are not growing. So there is nothing special which this country has achieved in the last 49years, to worth celebrating.
"I still describe Nigeria at 49 as a toddler, a reality that cannot be understood. I will also describe Nigeria as an imbecile, I am sorry to say, I am a Nigeria and I want to be proud to be a Nigerian, but the fact that there is nothing to be proud about, that is why I am describing Nigeria as such. Our leaders are there for themselves, they are not there with any vision or mission for the people, they are there just for themselves," he said.
Onimisi said that though many people may see the creation of additional states as development, but most of the states were arbitrarily and artificially created. They were created by the reason of the sincere needs of the people and so the state cannot be said to be an achievement of the past and present ruling governments.
"In fact, in creating those states they recreated more troubles, because until you restructure this country and change the system, the more states you create, the more troubles you are creating. So creation of additional states does not represent achievements of this nation as far as I am concerned. These promises I will say have not been achieved, I will say that in the first republic we had internal autonomy; regions have the powers to proceed at their own pace without confrontation from any centre.
"Provinces had the powers to also proceed at their own pace without the regional governments interfering. But today, we have 36 States, but at the center, the federal government still dictates to the states what they can do and what they cannot do. That is not progress; what it means is that we were freer during the colonial era than we are today.
"During the colonial era, there were different police forces for different regions; the regional governments had their police force. But today, we only have one Police Force, remotely controlled from one place and therefore makes it ineffective and which leads to corruption in the country. So, where is the progress? A country where we still depend on imported food to eat, a country that is supposed to have the most fertile land that could produce food to feed the world, still depends on imported food for her citizenry, is that progress?" he said.
He said that Nigerians must blame themselves as well as their leaders, that if Nigerian leaders are not doing well, Nigerians as followers must check them and be prepared to confront them at any given period. "But today, we are so docile, we are almost all cowards. Nigeria cannot progress until the day Nigerians will begin to caution their leaders properly, and begin to check their leaders to correct their steps.
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"That is why I will say that Nigeria political opposition parties are weak, they are weak because Nigeria voters are weak; they are weak because Nigerians are afraid to confront their leaders. Otherwise, if my political party, for example, has followers that are cautioning their leaders and asking questions why some things are not working, they will be bold enough to confront the government.
"But Nigerians easily chicken out; that makes the leaders to have all the latitude they need to do whatever they are doing, and that is not in the best interest of this nation. That was why some of us gathered together under PRONACO to ensure that the problems of the country are resolved through proper restructuring, there will be a constitution that befits a multinational country like Nigeria, but the government is not listening.
"Instead, they are using this imposed Constitution to steal, to cheat and to destroy the legacies of our first republic fathers and leaders.
Completely agree. Racism has dug in deep into class and soco-economic oppression in the USA. We need to vote with our wallets and our ballots. Just don't go ... don't feed the white capitalist machine. We need to starve the bastards. A black president cleary is a good thing, but stalling the rise of social democracy mostly hurts people of color. We need to say enough ... we have had enough and just not take anymore.
Mr. cut and paste is back lol!
Without revealing any of the story — Oh yes-yes-yes!! 'District 9' is the must-see movie of 2009! Intelligently, this latest film in the science fiction thriller genre, plot and substance are not overwhelmed by special effects or other cinematic-dramatic trickery. In fact, all of the elements in 'District 9' are complemented by how they interplay — most times adding more insight to the overall story on a conscious and sometimes unconscious level. For me, even if it was a 3-hour 3-D movie, the plot and action would have held-up with integrity.
Finally! — science fiction for thinking adults, and savvy 5th graders. Again don't miss this movie — this summer and beyond. Oh, yes-yes-yes!! A sequel will be justified.
Check your bladder early, and don't dare walk-in late on this one!
Dennis Moore — Publisher — http://www.POTUSworld.com — ppceo@potusworld.com
RELATED LINKS:
http://www.d-9.com/
http://www.district9movie.com/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/District_9
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extraterrestrial_life
http://www.uslaw.com/library/Intellectual_Property_Law/Clintons_State_De...
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1136608/
It's prominent for people to learn though, you need to buy college term paper or buy research paper just because a school isn't the best at everything doesn't mean it can't be the finest at sparse things. Essays blogs can dispense more usefull for your article you can also buy essay. But first of all, my tribute to this article, it has a absolute angle.
You see jim, "CHE" has the idea; in your world the main lackey was just doing his job; But Black people are not in some gang in the district. They live there! Black women are just.. well... you know! And you make my point about buying it hook and line by saying they "the blacks" are all just gangbangers.
But given that the "main lackey" is said to have had prolonged sexual contact with aliens, you're somehow dismissive of how this lie is used about Black women!
This "lackey" found that any alien children had to be killed. (hence "we call this trolling for contact with the enemy" -- .ie. Iraq - kill all combat age men in that town we all know of...) That said and that way -- we go from relocation to kill them all. -- .ie. USA - Wounded Knee
My interest here is Black people and how you and your woman are portrayed in the media. The outrages lies ; told about you and your children. You must say that you are a man and are capable of all things other men have done.
In sum, where is the OAU and AU on D9. – Are there orders by the AU to collect weapons for study, by 'buying' them from the aliens to get free of the MNU! – you see jim, there are a number directions for the movie that gives Black people a scientific approach to the problem of the Aliens – But due to their media lies – you only see me as some sort of gang member.. and
IT IS UP TO YOU TO CONTINUE OUR PEOPLES STERUGGLE