District 9: Spoiler-Packed Thoughts

[major_clanger]

I saw District 9 last week but for various reasons haven't got around to commenting on it yet. Since then tamaranth has posted her thoughts, which I pretty much agree with but which also include a link to a very negative review that I've seen some other references to. That reviewer's main complaints seem to be:

Comments

[zotz]

I believe concentration camps were first used in Cuba during the Spanish-American War a few years earlier, although we certainly popularised and commercialised the concept.

[hairyears]

No, the Germans pioneered the concept of concentrating an ethnic group in camps with the specific aim of extermination through forced labour and starvation at the turn of the last century, in Namibia. The camp commander, Ritter von Epp, went on to coomand a unit of the Freicorps and bankroll the NASDP, the precursor of the National Socialists.

The camp is now a holiday resort, and no-one seems to know what the sinuous rows of little earthen mounds were for or who built them. At least, no-one who speaks to tourists and schoolchildren.

[zotz]

From a brief look, that seems to have been about 1904 or thereabouts. They were used in Cuba around 1897.

[nmg]

What about Greyfriars kirkyard and the Covenanter's prison?

[handslive]

Slightly different take on D9, but interesting from a techno-geek logistics point of view.

Their points about the lack of appropriate ground support for the security forces actually seems reasonable. The math on attempting to airlift the alien refugees is spot on.

I hadn't given much thought to the issues you raise above because I'm not very enlightened I guess. Now that you've mentioned them I feel like I was asleep the whole time.

[bugshaw]

Airlift? I was assuming cattle trucks or holocaust train...

[bellinghman]

The airlift was back in the '82, when the ship appeared in the sky, not the removal to District 10.

[bugshaw]

So it was, I'd forgotten that part.

[smofbabe]

I agree with your assessment of why blacks and women would likely not have had positions of power. I didn't like the movie for other reasons, however, although I did think that for a change, the aliens were really alien. From my review: "The parallels and symbolism with Real World marginalized minority populations are heavyhanded, and the "who is really evil" plot is fairly predictable. We never really find out much more about the aliens, and the subplot about the ability to use alien weaponry seems overblown given that the weapons don't seem that much better than human ones."

The violence is relentless: much of the movie consists of endless scenes of either out-of-control sadistic mercenaries, Nigerian underworld figures, or the bureaucrat and his alien companion as they shoot at or blow up things and each other. I could have done with a lot more plot and a lot less "fooks" and spattering blood and butchery."

[uitlander]

I saw District 9 last night and found it tremendously powerful. It did feel as if we were straight back in the ZAR of the 80s and before. What I suspect a significant number of people don't get in the UK are the resonances for South Africans (I'm not, but I've spent enough time doing fieldwork there that I picked at least some of them up, and this is what made it all the more chilling).

For example, does District 6 mean anything to you?

Did you know that van der Merwe is a common enough Afrikaans surname, but also colloquial shorthand for the village idiot?

I suspect there is a lot more in there I didn't get, and I'd like to watch it again with some south Africans.

[major_clanger]

The first, yes; the second, no I didn't know that!

[surliminal]

Tho half of white SA (almost literally) is called van der Merwe (I know at least 2 such) -- one of the weird things about the Afrikaans popn is there are very very few surnames between them!

[uitlander]

True it's the 'Smith' or 'Jones' of the country, but I doubt the colloquial joke was unintended.

[surliminal]

the guy has said in several interviews that he set out to write an sf film set in Jo Burg rather than a Big Arthouse Apartheid Movie so i suspect he simply didn't think hard about a lot of this stuff

[marrog]

I thougt his main point was that apartheid ending did not change the fundamnetal power structures - but I may be attributing sophistication.

This was my feeling also - I don't know a lot about modern-day SA but I was interested to see that there was still a predominance of white folk in power (even at middle management level) and to see a level of casual racism going on (aside from the very direct racism against the Nigerians). I assumed that it was intentional and not just oversight.