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Director: Neill BlomkampAired: 2009 Other notable films:
- Elysium
- Chappie
Oscar Nominee:
- Best Motion Picture of the Year
- Best Writing, Adapted Screenplay
- Best Achievement in Film Editing
- Best Achievement in Visual Effects Winner
Exploitation, white savior complex, and reeducation. These are all things that come to mind when I think of white people coming across any uncolonized population. District 9's dystopian South Africa upholds these expectations - only this time it's with aliens. Director Neill Blomkamp takes the helm of this feature film based on a short film he created four years prior.
The government in this speculative world forcibly makes its way into an enormous alien ship that is hovering above Johanessburg. Upon climbing into this ship they discover aliens that are weak, malnourished, and dying (or so the white saviors assume). In typical fashion, the government announces that the aliens will be relocated to earth and nursed back to health. Naturally, all that really means is that they put the aliens into what is essentially a refugee camp ill-equipped to shelter or sustain them. Before long, hostility between humans and aliens emerges.
Blomkamp opts to narrow the storyline down to the personal experience of Wikus van der Merwe, a somewhat incompetent employee of a security company who is promoted to oversee the alien relocation project in which the aliens are evicted and sent to a new settlement further from the city. While in the field Van der Merwe becomes infected with an unknown alien substance and as he grapples to understand what has happened to him, the only support that he has is that of an alien named Christopher Johnson.
Apartheid is a history familiar across much of the world, notorious for its extreme segregation, unfathomable inhumanity, and existence into the 1990s. District 9 takes apartheid and parallels it with what would happen if an alien race touched down in South Africa. Brutal, heartwrenching, and all too believable, Blomkamp’s feature film debut was an international success.
The government in this speculative world forcibly makes its way into an enormous alien ship that is hovering above Johanessburg. Upon climbing into this ship they discover aliens that are weak, malnourished, and dying (or so the white saviors assume). In typical fashion, the government announces that the aliens will be relocated to earth and nursed back to health. Naturally, all that really means is that they put the aliens into what is essentially a refugee camp ill-equipped to shelter or sustain them. Before long, hostility between humans and aliens emerges.
Blomkamp opts to narrow the storyline down to the personal experience of Wikus van der Merwe, a somewhat incompetent employee of a security company who is promoted to oversee the alien relocation project in which the aliens are evicted and sent to a new settlement further from the city. While in the field Van der Merwe becomes infected with an unknown alien substance and as he grapples to understand what has happened to him, the only support that he has is that of an alien named Christopher Johnson.
Apartheid is a history familiar across much of the world, notorious for its extreme segregation, unfathomable inhumanity, and existence into the 1990s. District 9 takes apartheid and parallels it with what would happen if an alien race touched down in South Africa. Brutal, heartwrenching, and all too believable, Blomkamp’s feature film debut was an international success.
Tech as Catalyst for Greed
District 9 portrays a human preoccupation with alien technology, motivated by the potential for money. The weaponry that this alien race possesses can only be operated by the aliens and figuring out how to make it human-operable becomes the prime interest of the government agencies. Through interpersonal interactions, it becomes evident that the involved individuals’ humanity is overpowered by their greed for the money that harnessing this technology could gain.Tech as Catalyst for Greed
This mission to harness alien technology for human use is elaborate and often gruesome. Nigerian gangs trade cat food, which is essentially a drug for the aliens, in return for their weapons. They use brutal tactics to satisfy their hunger for weapons that are not even of use to humans yet.
The private security company that van der Merwe works for has an elaborate study going on behind the scenes to figure out how to make these guns work. The scenes in which we encounter the experiments and studies that they are doing are gory and emotional. They effectively communicate the injustice and exploitation that these people are readily participating in out of greed.
Aliens in the eyes of Humans - Racial Prejudice
District 9 at once demonstrates intolerance of foreigners and unfamiliar races by creating the Alien, as well as being set in the context of apartheid. We are confronted with the explicit outcasting of groups of people. The Black people live in townships and are treated as subservient to white people - this was the reality of Apartheid during the period in which this film is set. The aliens live in almost identical conditions, but in the film, their treatment is worse than that of the Black humans. The Black people agree with the white people that the aliens do not belong and should be sent home, instead of feeling empathy for others that are being treated as they are.Aliens in the eyes of Humans - Racial Prejudice
The alien language is referred to as a “clicking language”, which is also interesting in the context of the African setting. Many African languages are known for being “clicking languages” and are often racistly deemed primitive. This parallel of the aliens with native Africans is subtle but intentional.
Of course, in the human spirit of nastiness, derogatory terms for the aliens also developed. They are most commonly referred to as “prawns” in the film. This name came from their appearance which is similar to that of the sea creature of the same name.
For the purpose of harnessing their technology, the aliens are treated like science experiments by the humans. The people are completely able to distance themselves from them because they believe they are fundamentally different. Even Van der Merwe is seen as fair-game once he has been infected by the alien substance because he is now tainted.
The language and behavior of the humans in the film demonstrate a belief that the aliens are stupid and vicious. However, we see them at their most vulnerable, when the humans are not around them, and come to see that they are possibly more intelligent than humans (so much so that humans want their technology) and gentle when unprovoked. Christopher Johnson has a son and they have a deep care for each other and are kind and helpful to Wikus - the same can’t be said of the human interactions with the aliens. These interactions that we witness make us even more sympathetic towards the aliens, as we see their fear and pain.
Film Style
Blomkamp had a clear sense of direction with the mockumentary filming style. The film is created to feel like a documentary from start to finish. In order to achieve this, most scenes are filmed with a handheld camera. This technique, often used for documentary films, allows the audience to feel like we are there in the action.Film Style
To continue along with this mockumentary style, interview shots are interspersed throughout the film to provide context for the history of the aliens’ presence in Johannesburg. These are the only shots that differ in technique from the handheld shots. These are still, close-up shots intended to mimic what is customary in documentary interviews.
These two film techniques succeed at immersing us in the action while still providing necessary context for the importance of certain things - such as what van der Merwe was like before being promoted to his leadership position.
My Take
Blomkamp took familiar topics - colonization and exploitation - and made them unfamiliar by creating an alien race that no person watching the movie would have preconceived perceptions of. This tactic allows the audience to reconsider these topics in a way they have not seen them before, opening up the opportunity for conversation and reconsideration.The mockumentary style is effective at making District 9 seem as realistic as possible. Rather than coming across as a movie made purely for entertainment and enjoyment, this style automatically puts us in a seat that is a little more uncomfortable and keeps us alert - like seeing this on the news might.Most poignant to me is the success with which Blomkamp parallels this dystopia with reality. This film and the treatment of the aliens that arrive on earth is strikingly similar to how colonists treated Africans in South Africa. From telling them they were primitive and wanting to reeducate them with their own knowledge while at once adopting many of their techniques for building, hunting, and medicine, to relegating them to inadequate housing camps far from the city, these narratives are so similar but are made to feel so novel.My Take
As a South African, watching this film always reminds me of the injustices that previously formally oppressed people faced, and how much we should be doing in terms of reparations to create a world that is more equal in the present. While this is set in South Africa in the context of local history, it can easily be applied, even more abstractly, to many other countries.If nothing else, it's an entertaining watch that maintains suspense and has some good lesser-know South African actors. If you give it a try, you may find yourself pleasantly surprised by this dystopian take on racial polarization with aliens.
My Rating:
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