Review: Albino United/District 9
I just found the BBC "Sherlock" kink meme. You guys may never see me again! But first, I wanted to write up my thoughts about District 9. I'm a lot late to the party with this one, but I can't be the only one.
My roommate and I decided we needed girl time after the horror that was introducing her kinda maybe possibly boyfriend to me. (The second thing he said to me [the first being 'hi'] was that my mole was ugly and I needed to get it removed... He is no longer in the picture.) So we chose to watch what was quite possibly the most disturbing double feature in the history of double features. On accident.
Kim wanted to watch Albino United. It's a documentary about a group of albino boys in Tanzania who start a soccer team in order to get more respect for the plight of albinos in their country. It was quite good, and I recommend it.
The documentarians make sure to treat the subject of the film with respect. It's also very thorough. They talk to people on both sides of the "Are albinos really human?" debate. Granted the people on the "NO!" side end up looking ignorant and fearful, but that's not through anything the documentarians did. It's just really hard to think of someone as intelligent when they're talking about smearing albino blood on their fishing nets in order to catch more fish. And it's even harder to empathize with them, but the documentarians manage to make it happen. They take great care to point out that the fishermen only do it because they're scared and desperate. They'll do anything to make more money for their families. Also, the documentary is just as much about the soccer as it is about the albinos. The soccer is obviously secondary, but it is kept very much in focus for all of it, except the bits in America.
However, the film deals entirely with albinos of African-descent. Even when talking to albinos in America, they're of African-descent. I understand the reason for this, but it makes it seem like there are no albinos of any other race. Albinos in other races of colour face a lot of the same prejudices ("You're not really black/Chinese/Spanish!"). However, as far as I know, only Tanzanian albinos are eaten for magic powers so it's really not that much of a problem with the documentary. Another shortcoming is that the method of translating people varies from scene-to-scene. Bit players have voice-over translations whereas people with large roles in the documentary have text translations. And sometimes the same person will have a voice-over translation, then in the next scene a text translation, then another voice-over translation. I just wished they'd pick one or the other and keep it for everyone. I also didn't enjoy the bits in America. They weren't connected to the rest of the documentary so well. Interviewing an albino of African-descent who is a stand-up comedian made it seem like the documentarians felt they needed him to make the issue of interest to American. And I really hate that. (Something similar is coming up during District 9.) I hate that everyone assumes that Americans are so self-centred that they don't care what's happening to these footballers in Tanzania even though they're being killed and discriminated against. We need some sort of American connection before we'll sit through the rest of the film. The stuff with the comedian was interesting, but it interrupted the flow of the film.
Albino United is not for the squeamish. The most disturbing bit is when the documentarians talk to several fishermen and voodoo priests. All of whom say albinos aren't human. Most of them also admit to using albino hair and body parts in their lines of work. The worst bit was the interview with the couple whose ten-year-old son was murdered on his way home from school. They had to place a heavy slab of concrete on top of his body to keep people from digging him up and harvesting his blood, organs, and bones for voodoo spells. It was very nerve-wracking to watch the father explain that while holding a picture of his son as his wife sobs just offscreen.
It's a good documentary, and it's interesting. I recommend it, especially if you know anything about the region.
But it's not appropriate for a girls' night. I got to choose the next film so I decided on District 9, which I've been meaning to watch for a while. I just keep getting distracted by things like Mega Shark vs. Giant Octopus and Chopping Mall.
District 9 is absolutely fantastic! To steal some phrases from TVTropes, it's very anvilicious, but some anvils need to be dropped. It's high-concept scifi done properly. And it's a film about racism not by Spike Lee. I like Lee (25th Hour is one of my favourite films), but it's nice to have a bit of variety on such an important subject. (For those who don't know, the title is a reference to the infamous District 6 resettlement when the apartheid government forced 60,000 blacks out of their homes into smaller, worse conditions. Supposedly, they did it to curb violence. Most likely it was done because District 6 was in a really good location central to the governmental buildings, harbour, and river.)
The movie begins as a documentary about Wikus Van de Merwe, something horrible that happened to him, and the forced migration of aliens, derisively called prawns, from the slum of District 9 to District 10. This actually works really well. It sets up the idea of an unreliable narrator, which is something I really enjoy. Especially when quite a bit of the film is never actually explained. (Why didn't the aliens fight back? Why did the fluid turn a human into an alien? Why did they chop up aliens and experiment on them?) Also, it really does make it seem like the film is saying "You should know this already." When the characters explain things that should be obvious, they do so with a little eye roll or with obvious enthusiasm that makes it seem like they're excited to be smarter than someone else. They live this, and they think the audience lives it too. And it really works for me.
An alien spaceship came to a halt over Johannesburg 28 years ago. (1982/06/01 according to time stamps.) After about three months of absolutely nothing happening, the South Africans finally punch their way into the spaceship and find a bunch of aimless, sick, weak aliens. They round them up and take them down into Joburg. Why? Because it was something to do. It very effectively stopped Apartheid so yay?
District 9 is home to the vast majority of the aliens and several humans, mainly Nigerian gangs and prostitutes. There is mention of interspecies prostitution at this point. I'm going to try to not think about that. MNU (the company who "takes care" of the aliens) has decided to move them out of District 9 and into the tent city of District 10. Because it'll be better for the aliens and will decrease the amount of crime. Based on the real life case, I'm assuming District 9 is actually prime real estate.
Since it's 2010, people are actually watching the South Africans so MNU has to go in, serve eviction notices, get the aliens to sign them, and then move them out into the new and awesome District 10. District 10 is not actually awesome, but the fliers and brochures make it look pretty cool. The man in charge of this is Wikus Van De Merwe. He's an utter prat and an incompetent bureaucrat who was just promoted to this position. According to his father-in-law, who just so happens to be a MNU big wig, this is because Wikus is awesome. This is a lie.
It's also a really cool bait-and-switch. The audience assumes that the father-in-law is trying to promote Wikus so his wife is happier and has more money. Nope. He hates Wikus with a passion. He knows the man is incompetent, and he's hoping Wikus gets seriously injured (preferably killed) during the eviction notice serving and then his daughter can marry someone better. Tania is far out of Wikus's league and her dad is very obviously a powerful man so this makes a lot of sense to me. His little princess has married a bumbling idiotic fool because the fool is sweet; of course, he's going to try to get him out of the way.
At first, Wikus just seems like an idiot. But then he and his assistant Fundiswa go to District 9 with the MNU guards to serve eviction notices. Wikus tells Fundiswa that he doesn't need a bullet-proof vest or face mask, which just reinforces how bad he is at his job. Fundiswa has not been provided with a bullet-proof vest. This may or may not be racist. He's the only black man being interviewed about Wikus in the documentary parts, and he's the only black bureaucrat. He's also the only person without a vest. However, there are several black MNU guards, all of whom have vests. Kim and I couldn't decide if it was "you're outside of your place, boy!" racism on the part of MNU or if it was just to set up the irony of Fundiswa being the only member of Wikus's group to not end up hurt, especially since the first thing we both said was "He's going to get shot."
Wikus gleefully murders an entire shack full of baby aliens while laughing about it. He even gives one of the guards a piece of the equipment keeping the babies alive as a souvenir of his "first abortion" and the other guy laughs excitedly. That's definitely the first clue that Wikus is not the hero of the film. The MNU bureaucrats and guards make their way through District 9; casual racism is all over the place during this scene. It works really well. Even the people who are pro-alien are just casually racist toward them. It really grounds the film in realism.
However, at this point, I'm starting to wonder why people are being jerks to the aliens. At this point, they've shown that the aliens are stronger and taller than the humans. Several of them have taken small arms fire at a mid-range as if they're just being pushed. The alien weapons, which the humans can't use, are insanely powerful. Like exploding chunky soup powerful. (One of the weapons also appears to be the gravity gun from Half-Life, which is awesome and hilarious.) These particular aliens aren't smart, but they've managed to cross galaxies and their weapons are bio-coded. Meaning some of this species are way smarter than people. Why not treat them nicely and when their friends get here be like "We're good people. See?" This looks like a sure-fire way to have an alien invasion that ends in killing all humans.
Eventually, we come to the hero of the film an alien named Christopher Johnson. Chris and his friend Paul are doing something very delicate and obviously technological. They and their(?) son Oliver (whose name is never mentioned in the film) are the first aliens the audience has seen that have any sort of intelligence. Paul's smarter than the other aliens, but Chris and Oliver are on par with Wikus if not smarter than him. (Especially Oliver.) Wikus and crew arrive at Paul's place. Chris freaks out and tells Paul to go outside and deal with the humans politely while he sneaks back to his shack.
Paul goes outside and gets into a fight with Wikus. He breaks Wikus's arm, hurts one of the guards, and comes after Fundiswa who is not wearing a bullet-proof vest but does have his face mask on. At this point, Koobus Venter comes swooping in and saves the day. Koobus is basically this film's version of Col. Quaritch from Avatar. He likes killing aliens, and he's good at it. He also hates Wikus and gleefully makes his life hell.
After everybody gets fixed up, they start looking through the deceased Paul's shack. Wikus finds the metal tube that Chris and Paul were working on earlier. He explains to the cameras that it's obviously not dangerous and a thick black fluid drips out of it and into Wikus's mouth. Should've worn a face mask, douche. He asks the cameraman to fix it in post and films a short segment where he explains that no one knows what the tube is so it's better to be safe than sorry.
Wikus and crew get to Christopher Johnson's shack where Oliver is playing outside. Wikus throws Oliver some candy, but he chucks it back straight at Wikus's head. Chris comes outside to deal with the commotion. We find out that the aliens need to fill out papers and get permits before they can have and keep children. Chris reads over the eviction papers, points out some technicalities in it, and mentions that even if he signs it they can't move him today. Wikus is obviously out-of-his-depth. I'm not quite certain if this is because he didn't expect an alien to be intelligent or if Chris is smarter than him. Eventually Wikus blackmails him by threatening to take Oliver away.
Wikus doesn't feel well. He keeps throwing up, but instead of going to a doctor or something, he just keeps soldiering on. There's a nice homage to the Jeff Goldblum version of The Fly where he peels off several of his fingernails in the bathroom mirror. He goes home to Tania and admits to her that he may have crapped his pants. Just then the lights come on and everybody shouts, "SURPRISE!" I really LOL'd and then felt bad when he passed out on his cake moments later. Fun fact: his cake is shaped like the MNU building. The piece he cuts out is the part he and Chris blow a hole into later in the film.
Tania and Wikus go to the hospital. This is the part where I really start hating the subtitles. We're watching the American version. As far as I can tell, that means "Act like the people at home are stupid." In the lower left corner is a timestamp that gives the date, hours since infection, and the words 'Entrance to Hospital.' Across the bottom third of the screen, in a much heavier font (Kim pointed out that it's the same font the aliens' translation is in) it reads, "Arrival at Hospital." It's completely redundant, and it's not the only time the film does it. Earlier there was a C.G. (the term for non-subtitle text on the screen) reading, "12 km to destination." The lower third of the screen read, "12 kilometers to District 9, alien settlement." Just in case we had forgotten where they were going in the five minutes since they last told us. Almost every C.G. on the screen gets a heavier C.G. that's been dumbed down or reworded stating the exact same thing as the other C.G. It's really annoying, and it makes me want to punch someone in the face.
At the hospital, the doctor asks Wikus what's been going on. Wikus admits that his fingernails have been falling off. And that he's been feeling dizzy and suffering nausea for some time now. And black fluid was dripping from his nose earlier, is that bad? The doctor is looking at Wikus like he's an idiot for waiting so long. Then he cuts off the cast on his left arm to see what's happening. Oh look, Wikus has an alien arm! The doc freaks out and hits the panic button. The guards separate Wikus from everyone else and take him into the MNU headquarters.
This is where Tania's father reveals that he's an unethical douchebag. He tells Wikus that he's the first alien-human hybrid that hasn't died horrifically. So they're going to kill him to figure out why he's not already dead. There's a lot of horrific testing on Wikus during which he's awake without any kind of anesthesia. And he's not the first person to go through with it. The film hints around that other people have been purposely infected with all sorts of alien diseases/blood/tissues/etc. in an attempt to make an alien-human hybrid, but all of those have been fatal experiments. There's also several mutilated alien bodies laying around. And what looks like a human fetus in a jar. I'm not going to think about that too hard either.
Eventually, the scientists realize that so long as its in Wikus's alien hand, he can use alien weapons. So they shove aliens into his left hand and if he refuses to shoot, they taser him so his fingers will contract and pull the trigger. They push an innocent alien in front of Wikus, and for a moment, he becomes a decent person begging to be allowed to shoot anything else. He even offers to shoot a pig instead, but they taser him. Wikus's despair over killing the alien is fantastic. For the actor to have just been some guy the director knew, he is absolutely fantastic. He keeps Wikus real; he's like that guy who is racist just because everybody else is but really knows it's wrong. And this scene is the first time that comes through.
Wikus's father-in-law tells the scientists to remove Wikus's heart. While he's still alive. Understandably, Wikus thinks this is a bad idea and escapes from the hospital, using the ridiculously powerful alien technology they've been having him play with. Yeah, that wasn't such a good idea, was it, you morons?
The MNU has to get their half-alien experiment back before he tells someone what they're doing. So they tell all the national news organizations that he has a horrible alien STD. Based on the viral advertising, I think this is equivalent to telling everybody that Wikus slept with a dog and is now pregnant with its puppies. Try not to think about that too hard.
Wikus ends up hiding out in District 9 since it's filled with criminals and aliens that haven't moved yet. Eventually, he finds his way to Chris and Oliver. They hide him from the searching MNU helicopters. Oliver is absolutely adorable. At one point, he looks at his injured arm and compares it to Wikus's injured arm and says, "We're the same!" Wikus flips his crap, but it's adorable and I want to cuddle Oliver for the rest of forever.
Chris tells Wikus that if he can find the silver tube full of fluid, he can get Wikus back to the mothership and fix him. Unfortunately, the tube of fluid is deep within the MNU lab. There's a lovely bit of characterization between all of them. Eventually, Wikus comes back and says that while it's a suicide mission, he can get them into the lab. They go to the Nigerian gang leader who is a BAMF even though he's in a wheelchair. He's simply the scariest character in a film with aliens that can rip off and eat people's heads. The Nigerian finds out that Wikus is the guy the news says had sex with an alien. Wikus manages to steal the weapons from the gang, and the leader vows to find Wikus and eat his arm. (We kinda freaked out then. What's the chance of watching two completely unrelated films which both have voodoo priests telling people to eat the main characters to gain magical powers?)
Chris and Wikus break into MNU, and all the bureaucrats are evacuated. Right past the two heavily armed protagonists. Well, that escape plan would've worked real well if this was an actual alien attack. Fortunately, Wikus and Chris don't want to kill people. They get into the lab where the guards are waiting for them. The guard shoot the hell out of everything while Chris pretty much shuts down upon seeing what the MNU is doing to his people. They grab the metal tube, and Wikus snaps Chris out of it. Chris proceeds to grab three pieces of junk and, while running away, builds a bomb. Seriously, screwing with the aliens keeps looking worse and worse.
They get back to Chris's house and send Oliver into the escape ship/command unit they've been hiding beneath it. Wikus asks how long it'll take to turn him back into a human; Chris says three years and Wikus flips his crap again. After seeing what the humans are doing to his people, Chris has decided to go home and get reinforcements first. He'll need all of the fluid so he can fly back as quickly as possible. Wikus beats Chris until he's unconscious. Wikus runs downstairs and tells Oliver they're going up to the mothership without Chris. As they start flying away, MNU finally gets its mess together and blasts the ship out of the sky.
The guards arrest Wikus and Chris and load them into South African humvees. Oliver hides because he is super tiny and absolutely adorable. Then, he uses his super magnificent genius to hack into the mothership and blow shit up. While he's doing that, the Nigerians start fighting the MNU guards for Wikus. It's quite good and well choreographed.The Nigerians win, and the voodoo priestess prepares to kill and fed Wikus to the leader. Then Oliver hits the activate mini-mecha button, and all the Nigerians get blown to hell. Wikus climbs into the mecha and heads out into District 9.
Koobus and his crew has Chris on the ground. They're beating the crap out of him in an effort to get information out of him. Wikus looks like he's going to man up, but instead, he screams like a little girl and runs away. Koobus laughs and orders one of his men to kill Chris. Somehow Wikus manages to hear this; I like to think it's Oliver doing something with the computer in order to save his daddy. (Technically, neither Chris nor Oliver are guys, but they have men's names so...)
Wikus mans up in the coolest way possible. The mecha's weapons include a lightning gun, which is all kinds of nifty, and Half-Life's gravity gun. At one point, he picks up a pig and shoots it at someone. It is simultaneously awesome and hilarious. The whole fight sequence is fantastic. Especially since they only had $30 million to make the whole film.
Wikus drags Chris to his feet. And they start running back to the command ship whilst fighting off the MNU and Nigerians. Meanwhile, Oliver is piloting the mothership so it's directly over District 9. He may be the smartest being in the whole movie. Wikus is protecting Chris by staying between him and the bullets. He eventually mans up to human being level and tells Chris to get to Oliver and go home. It's obvious that Wikus thinks he's going to be dragged back to MNU and cut open again. It really shows how much he's grown since the beginning of the movie.
Chris promises to return and fix him. As Chris and Oliver get tractor beamed up into the ship, the audience finally gets to see how badly beaten Chris actually was. It's very subtle, but Chris keeps drifting in-and-out of consciousness. Kim and I had a long conversation about what would happen if he and Oliver got back to the homeworld and Chris had died based on the beating. But it's a moot point.
Chris and Oliver leave Earth as Wikus gets blasted with an *anti-tank missile*. It's badass. He takes everybody out until it's just Wikus and Koobus. Koobus gets Wikus out of the mecha through shooting it repeatedly with extreme prejudice. Koobus gets ready to blow Wikus's brains out. And the calvary shows up. The more violent, less intelligent aliens pop up and rip Koobus to pieces. One of them *eats* his head.
The movie ends with more documentary bits. Fundiswa, the assistant from the beginning of the film, is in prison for hacking into the MNU's computer and releasing the reports of what the MNU had been doing to the aliens. They've been removed from being in charge, and a new company is in control of District 10. Where the population is 2.5 million and rising. This is a very subtle way to show how different the new group is. The announcer says that no one has seen Wikus since the day the mothership left Earth. They show some of the early documentary when Wikus was still the guy-in-charge. He talks about how much he loves his wife and how she's his angel. It's quite sweet, and I want to hug him. Then they talk to Tania who is holding a metal flower that was left for her on the doorstep. She says, "Of course, Wikus is dead." but I don't believe her. It's very obvious that everyone keeps telling her that and she keeps agreeing with them, but that she doesn't believe it at all. The last shot of the film is an alien with an injured left arm, making a metal flower in the middle of District 10. All together now: AWWWWWWWW!
It's really good. This film is fantastic. I completely recommend it. The scifi is high concept and done well. The effects are brilliant, and the fight scenes are well choreographed. I was never bored and couldn't believe that the film was already over at the end. It keeps hitting you with its message, but it's something that needs to be pounded into people. The acting is fabulous, especially since it's the main actor's first film. (Well, second, but the first was the short film that became this.) You really believe everyone, and some of their reactions are really subtle. Wikus's father and Koobus are the two characters who are most unbelievable, but if people have been encouraging their behaviour, it can be understandable.
I hate that the American version feels that the audience needs two C.G.s to understand things as simple as "12 km from destination." Also the messianic imagery with Chris (C.J. who is betrayed by a friend, beaten horribly, and will return in three days years) is at times a little over-the-top. Overall, it's completely enjoyable. I can't recommend District 9 enough.
And I think this is the longest post I've ever written...
My roommate and I decided we needed girl time after the horror that was introducing her kinda maybe possibly boyfriend to me. (The second thing he said to me [the first being 'hi'] was that my mole was ugly and I needed to get it removed... He is no longer in the picture.) So we chose to watch what was quite possibly the most disturbing double feature in the history of double features. On accident.
Kim wanted to watch Albino United. It's a documentary about a group of albino boys in Tanzania who start a soccer team in order to get more respect for the plight of albinos in their country. It was quite good, and I recommend it.
The documentarians make sure to treat the subject of the film with respect. It's also very thorough. They talk to people on both sides of the "Are albinos really human?" debate. Granted the people on the "NO!" side end up looking ignorant and fearful, but that's not through anything the documentarians did. It's just really hard to think of someone as intelligent when they're talking about smearing albino blood on their fishing nets in order to catch more fish. And it's even harder to empathize with them, but the documentarians manage to make it happen. They take great care to point out that the fishermen only do it because they're scared and desperate. They'll do anything to make more money for their families. Also, the documentary is just as much about the soccer as it is about the albinos. The soccer is obviously secondary, but it is kept very much in focus for all of it, except the bits in America.
However, the film deals entirely with albinos of African-descent. Even when talking to albinos in America, they're of African-descent. I understand the reason for this, but it makes it seem like there are no albinos of any other race. Albinos in other races of colour face a lot of the same prejudices ("You're not really black/Chinese/Spanish!"). However, as far as I know, only Tanzanian albinos are eaten for magic powers so it's really not that much of a problem with the documentary. Another shortcoming is that the method of translating people varies from scene-to-scene. Bit players have voice-over translations whereas people with large roles in the documentary have text translations. And sometimes the same person will have a voice-over translation, then in the next scene a text translation, then another voice-over translation. I just wished they'd pick one or the other and keep it for everyone. I also didn't enjoy the bits in America. They weren't connected to the rest of the documentary so well. Interviewing an albino of African-descent who is a stand-up comedian made it seem like the documentarians felt they needed him to make the issue of interest to American. And I really hate that. (Something similar is coming up during District 9.) I hate that everyone assumes that Americans are so self-centred that they don't care what's happening to these footballers in Tanzania even though they're being killed and discriminated against. We need some sort of American connection before we'll sit through the rest of the film. The stuff with the comedian was interesting, but it interrupted the flow of the film.
Albino United is not for the squeamish. The most disturbing bit is when the documentarians talk to several fishermen and voodoo priests. All of whom say albinos aren't human. Most of them also admit to using albino hair and body parts in their lines of work. The worst bit was the interview with the couple whose ten-year-old son was murdered on his way home from school. They had to place a heavy slab of concrete on top of his body to keep people from digging him up and harvesting his blood, organs, and bones for voodoo spells. It was very nerve-wracking to watch the father explain that while holding a picture of his son as his wife sobs just offscreen.
It's a good documentary, and it's interesting. I recommend it, especially if you know anything about the region.
But it's not appropriate for a girls' night. I got to choose the next film so I decided on District 9, which I've been meaning to watch for a while. I just keep getting distracted by things like Mega Shark vs. Giant Octopus and Chopping Mall.
District 9 is absolutely fantastic! To steal some phrases from TVTropes, it's very anvilicious, but some anvils need to be dropped. It's high-concept scifi done properly. And it's a film about racism not by Spike Lee. I like Lee (25th Hour is one of my favourite films), but it's nice to have a bit of variety on such an important subject. (For those who don't know, the title is a reference to the infamous District 6 resettlement when the apartheid government forced 60,000 blacks out of their homes into smaller, worse conditions. Supposedly, they did it to curb violence. Most likely it was done because District 6 was in a really good location central to the governmental buildings, harbour, and river.)
The movie begins as a documentary about Wikus Van de Merwe, something horrible that happened to him, and the forced migration of aliens, derisively called prawns, from the slum of District 9 to District 10. This actually works really well. It sets up the idea of an unreliable narrator, which is something I really enjoy. Especially when quite a bit of the film is never actually explained. (Why didn't the aliens fight back? Why did the fluid turn a human into an alien? Why did they chop up aliens and experiment on them?) Also, it really does make it seem like the film is saying "You should know this already." When the characters explain things that should be obvious, they do so with a little eye roll or with obvious enthusiasm that makes it seem like they're excited to be smarter than someone else. They live this, and they think the audience lives it too. And it really works for me.
An alien spaceship came to a halt over Johannesburg 28 years ago. (1982/06/01 according to time stamps.) After about three months of absolutely nothing happening, the South Africans finally punch their way into the spaceship and find a bunch of aimless, sick, weak aliens. They round them up and take them down into Joburg. Why? Because it was something to do. It very effectively stopped Apartheid so yay?
District 9 is home to the vast majority of the aliens and several humans, mainly Nigerian gangs and prostitutes. There is mention of interspecies prostitution at this point. I'm going to try to not think about that. MNU (the company who "takes care" of the aliens) has decided to move them out of District 9 and into the tent city of District 10. Because it'll be better for the aliens and will decrease the amount of crime. Based on the real life case, I'm assuming District 9 is actually prime real estate.
Since it's 2010, people are actually watching the South Africans so MNU has to go in, serve eviction notices, get the aliens to sign them, and then move them out into the new and awesome District 10. District 10 is not actually awesome, but the fliers and brochures make it look pretty cool. The man in charge of this is Wikus Van De Merwe. He's an utter prat and an incompetent bureaucrat who was just promoted to this position. According to his father-in-law, who just so happens to be a MNU big wig, this is because Wikus is awesome. This is a lie.
It's also a really cool bait-and-switch. The audience assumes that the father-in-law is trying to promote Wikus so his wife is happier and has more money. Nope. He hates Wikus with a passion. He knows the man is incompetent, and he's hoping Wikus gets seriously injured (preferably killed) during the eviction notice serving and then his daughter can marry someone better. Tania is far out of Wikus's league and her dad is very obviously a powerful man so this makes a lot of sense to me. His little princess has married a bumbling idiotic fool because the fool is sweet; of course, he's going to try to get him out of the way.
At first, Wikus just seems like an idiot. But then he and his assistant Fundiswa go to District 9 with the MNU guards to serve eviction notices. Wikus tells Fundiswa that he doesn't need a bullet-proof vest or face mask, which just reinforces how bad he is at his job. Fundiswa has not been provided with a bullet-proof vest. This may or may not be racist. He's the only black man being interviewed about Wikus in the documentary parts, and he's the only black bureaucrat. He's also the only person without a vest. However, there are several black MNU guards, all of whom have vests. Kim and I couldn't decide if it was "you're outside of your place, boy!" racism on the part of MNU or if it was just to set up the irony of Fundiswa being the only member of Wikus's group to not end up hurt, especially since the first thing we both said was "He's going to get shot."
Wikus gleefully murders an entire shack full of baby aliens while laughing about it. He even gives one of the guards a piece of the equipment keeping the babies alive as a souvenir of his "first abortion" and the other guy laughs excitedly. That's definitely the first clue that Wikus is not the hero of the film. The MNU bureaucrats and guards make their way through District 9; casual racism is all over the place during this scene. It works really well. Even the people who are pro-alien are just casually racist toward them. It really grounds the film in realism.
However, at this point, I'm starting to wonder why people are being jerks to the aliens. At this point, they've shown that the aliens are stronger and taller than the humans. Several of them have taken small arms fire at a mid-range as if they're just being pushed. The alien weapons, which the humans can't use, are insanely powerful. Like exploding chunky soup powerful. (One of the weapons also appears to be the gravity gun from Half-Life, which is awesome and hilarious.) These particular aliens aren't smart, but they've managed to cross galaxies and their weapons are bio-coded. Meaning some of this species are way smarter than people. Why not treat them nicely and when their friends get here be like "We're good people. See?" This looks like a sure-fire way to have an alien invasion that ends in killing all humans.
Eventually, we come to the hero of the film an alien named Christopher Johnson. Chris and his friend Paul are doing something very delicate and obviously technological. They and their(?) son Oliver (whose name is never mentioned in the film) are the first aliens the audience has seen that have any sort of intelligence. Paul's smarter than the other aliens, but Chris and Oliver are on par with Wikus if not smarter than him. (Especially Oliver.) Wikus and crew arrive at Paul's place. Chris freaks out and tells Paul to go outside and deal with the humans politely while he sneaks back to his shack.
Paul goes outside and gets into a fight with Wikus. He breaks Wikus's arm, hurts one of the guards, and comes after Fundiswa who is not wearing a bullet-proof vest but does have his face mask on. At this point, Koobus Venter comes swooping in and saves the day. Koobus is basically this film's version of Col. Quaritch from Avatar. He likes killing aliens, and he's good at it. He also hates Wikus and gleefully makes his life hell.
After everybody gets fixed up, they start looking through the deceased Paul's shack. Wikus finds the metal tube that Chris and Paul were working on earlier. He explains to the cameras that it's obviously not dangerous and a thick black fluid drips out of it and into Wikus's mouth. Should've worn a face mask, douche. He asks the cameraman to fix it in post and films a short segment where he explains that no one knows what the tube is so it's better to be safe than sorry.
Wikus and crew get to Christopher Johnson's shack where Oliver is playing outside. Wikus throws Oliver some candy, but he chucks it back straight at Wikus's head. Chris comes outside to deal with the commotion. We find out that the aliens need to fill out papers and get permits before they can have and keep children. Chris reads over the eviction papers, points out some technicalities in it, and mentions that even if he signs it they can't move him today. Wikus is obviously out-of-his-depth. I'm not quite certain if this is because he didn't expect an alien to be intelligent or if Chris is smarter than him. Eventually Wikus blackmails him by threatening to take Oliver away.
Wikus doesn't feel well. He keeps throwing up, but instead of going to a doctor or something, he just keeps soldiering on. There's a nice homage to the Jeff Goldblum version of The Fly where he peels off several of his fingernails in the bathroom mirror. He goes home to Tania and admits to her that he may have crapped his pants. Just then the lights come on and everybody shouts, "SURPRISE!" I really LOL'd and then felt bad when he passed out on his cake moments later. Fun fact: his cake is shaped like the MNU building. The piece he cuts out is the part he and Chris blow a hole into later in the film.
Tania and Wikus go to the hospital. This is the part where I really start hating the subtitles. We're watching the American version. As far as I can tell, that means "Act like the people at home are stupid." In the lower left corner is a timestamp that gives the date, hours since infection, and the words 'Entrance to Hospital.' Across the bottom third of the screen, in a much heavier font (Kim pointed out that it's the same font the aliens' translation is in) it reads, "Arrival at Hospital." It's completely redundant, and it's not the only time the film does it. Earlier there was a C.G. (the term for non-subtitle text on the screen) reading, "12 km to destination." The lower third of the screen read, "12 kilometers to District 9, alien settlement." Just in case we had forgotten where they were going in the five minutes since they last told us. Almost every C.G. on the screen gets a heavier C.G. that's been dumbed down or reworded stating the exact same thing as the other C.G. It's really annoying, and it makes me want to punch someone in the face.
At the hospital, the doctor asks Wikus what's been going on. Wikus admits that his fingernails have been falling off. And that he's been feeling dizzy and suffering nausea for some time now. And black fluid was dripping from his nose earlier, is that bad? The doctor is looking at Wikus like he's an idiot for waiting so long. Then he cuts off the cast on his left arm to see what's happening. Oh look, Wikus has an alien arm! The doc freaks out and hits the panic button. The guards separate Wikus from everyone else and take him into the MNU headquarters.
This is where Tania's father reveals that he's an unethical douchebag. He tells Wikus that he's the first alien-human hybrid that hasn't died horrifically. So they're going to kill him to figure out why he's not already dead. There's a lot of horrific testing on Wikus during which he's awake without any kind of anesthesia. And he's not the first person to go through with it. The film hints around that other people have been purposely infected with all sorts of alien diseases/blood/tissues/etc. in an attempt to make an alien-human hybrid, but all of those have been fatal experiments. There's also several mutilated alien bodies laying around. And what looks like a human fetus in a jar. I'm not going to think about that too hard either.
Eventually, the scientists realize that so long as its in Wikus's alien hand, he can use alien weapons. So they shove aliens into his left hand and if he refuses to shoot, they taser him so his fingers will contract and pull the trigger. They push an innocent alien in front of Wikus, and for a moment, he becomes a decent person begging to be allowed to shoot anything else. He even offers to shoot a pig instead, but they taser him. Wikus's despair over killing the alien is fantastic. For the actor to have just been some guy the director knew, he is absolutely fantastic. He keeps Wikus real; he's like that guy who is racist just because everybody else is but really knows it's wrong. And this scene is the first time that comes through.
Wikus's father-in-law tells the scientists to remove Wikus's heart. While he's still alive. Understandably, Wikus thinks this is a bad idea and escapes from the hospital, using the ridiculously powerful alien technology they've been having him play with. Yeah, that wasn't such a good idea, was it, you morons?
The MNU has to get their half-alien experiment back before he tells someone what they're doing. So they tell all the national news organizations that he has a horrible alien STD. Based on the viral advertising, I think this is equivalent to telling everybody that Wikus slept with a dog and is now pregnant with its puppies. Try not to think about that too hard.
Wikus ends up hiding out in District 9 since it's filled with criminals and aliens that haven't moved yet. Eventually, he finds his way to Chris and Oliver. They hide him from the searching MNU helicopters. Oliver is absolutely adorable. At one point, he looks at his injured arm and compares it to Wikus's injured arm and says, "We're the same!" Wikus flips his crap, but it's adorable and I want to cuddle Oliver for the rest of forever.
Chris tells Wikus that if he can find the silver tube full of fluid, he can get Wikus back to the mothership and fix him. Unfortunately, the tube of fluid is deep within the MNU lab. There's a lovely bit of characterization between all of them. Eventually, Wikus comes back and says that while it's a suicide mission, he can get them into the lab. They go to the Nigerian gang leader who is a BAMF even though he's in a wheelchair. He's simply the scariest character in a film with aliens that can rip off and eat people's heads. The Nigerian finds out that Wikus is the guy the news says had sex with an alien. Wikus manages to steal the weapons from the gang, and the leader vows to find Wikus and eat his arm. (We kinda freaked out then. What's the chance of watching two completely unrelated films which both have voodoo priests telling people to eat the main characters to gain magical powers?)
Chris and Wikus break into MNU, and all the bureaucrats are evacuated. Right past the two heavily armed protagonists. Well, that escape plan would've worked real well if this was an actual alien attack. Fortunately, Wikus and Chris don't want to kill people. They get into the lab where the guards are waiting for them. The guard shoot the hell out of everything while Chris pretty much shuts down upon seeing what the MNU is doing to his people. They grab the metal tube, and Wikus snaps Chris out of it. Chris proceeds to grab three pieces of junk and, while running away, builds a bomb. Seriously, screwing with the aliens keeps looking worse and worse.
They get back to Chris's house and send Oliver into the escape ship/command unit they've been hiding beneath it. Wikus asks how long it'll take to turn him back into a human; Chris says three years and Wikus flips his crap again. After seeing what the humans are doing to his people, Chris has decided to go home and get reinforcements first. He'll need all of the fluid so he can fly back as quickly as possible. Wikus beats Chris until he's unconscious. Wikus runs downstairs and tells Oliver they're going up to the mothership without Chris. As they start flying away, MNU finally gets its mess together and blasts the ship out of the sky.
The guards arrest Wikus and Chris and load them into South African humvees. Oliver hides because he is super tiny and absolutely adorable. Then, he uses his super magnificent genius to hack into the mothership and blow shit up. While he's doing that, the Nigerians start fighting the MNU guards for Wikus. It's quite good and well choreographed.The Nigerians win, and the voodoo priestess prepares to kill and fed Wikus to the leader. Then Oliver hits the activate mini-mecha button, and all the Nigerians get blown to hell. Wikus climbs into the mecha and heads out into District 9.
Koobus and his crew has Chris on the ground. They're beating the crap out of him in an effort to get information out of him. Wikus looks like he's going to man up, but instead, he screams like a little girl and runs away. Koobus laughs and orders one of his men to kill Chris. Somehow Wikus manages to hear this; I like to think it's Oliver doing something with the computer in order to save his daddy. (Technically, neither Chris nor Oliver are guys, but they have men's names so...)
Wikus mans up in the coolest way possible. The mecha's weapons include a lightning gun, which is all kinds of nifty, and Half-Life's gravity gun. At one point, he picks up a pig and shoots it at someone. It is simultaneously awesome and hilarious. The whole fight sequence is fantastic. Especially since they only had $30 million to make the whole film.
Wikus drags Chris to his feet. And they start running back to the command ship whilst fighting off the MNU and Nigerians. Meanwhile, Oliver is piloting the mothership so it's directly over District 9. He may be the smartest being in the whole movie. Wikus is protecting Chris by staying between him and the bullets. He eventually mans up to human being level and tells Chris to get to Oliver and go home. It's obvious that Wikus thinks he's going to be dragged back to MNU and cut open again. It really shows how much he's grown since the beginning of the movie.
Chris promises to return and fix him. As Chris and Oliver get tractor beamed up into the ship, the audience finally gets to see how badly beaten Chris actually was. It's very subtle, but Chris keeps drifting in-and-out of consciousness. Kim and I had a long conversation about what would happen if he and Oliver got back to the homeworld and Chris had died based on the beating. But it's a moot point.
Chris and Oliver leave Earth as Wikus gets blasted with an *anti-tank missile*. It's badass. He takes everybody out until it's just Wikus and Koobus. Koobus gets Wikus out of the mecha through shooting it repeatedly with extreme prejudice. Koobus gets ready to blow Wikus's brains out. And the calvary shows up. The more violent, less intelligent aliens pop up and rip Koobus to pieces. One of them *eats* his head.
The movie ends with more documentary bits. Fundiswa, the assistant from the beginning of the film, is in prison for hacking into the MNU's computer and releasing the reports of what the MNU had been doing to the aliens. They've been removed from being in charge, and a new company is in control of District 10. Where the population is 2.5 million and rising. This is a very subtle way to show how different the new group is. The announcer says that no one has seen Wikus since the day the mothership left Earth. They show some of the early documentary when Wikus was still the guy-in-charge. He talks about how much he loves his wife and how she's his angel. It's quite sweet, and I want to hug him. Then they talk to Tania who is holding a metal flower that was left for her on the doorstep. She says, "Of course, Wikus is dead." but I don't believe her. It's very obvious that everyone keeps telling her that and she keeps agreeing with them, but that she doesn't believe it at all. The last shot of the film is an alien with an injured left arm, making a metal flower in the middle of District 10. All together now: AWWWWWWWW!
It's really good. This film is fantastic. I completely recommend it. The scifi is high concept and done well. The effects are brilliant, and the fight scenes are well choreographed. I was never bored and couldn't believe that the film was already over at the end. It keeps hitting you with its message, but it's something that needs to be pounded into people. The acting is fabulous, especially since it's the main actor's first film. (Well, second, but the first was the short film that became this.) You really believe everyone, and some of their reactions are really subtle. Wikus's father and Koobus are the two characters who are most unbelievable, but if people have been encouraging their behaviour, it can be understandable.
I hate that the American version feels that the audience needs two C.G.s to understand things as simple as "12 km from destination." Also the messianic imagery with Chris (C.J. who is betrayed by a friend, beaten horribly, and will return in three days years) is at times a little over-the-top. Overall, it's completely enjoyable. I can't recommend District 9 enough.
And I think this is the longest post I've ever written...