District 9 discussion *possible spoilers*

[Invoke Ninja's True Power]

Good movie, although I found the personalities of the people in the movie quite abrasive. I completely identified with the aliens, intelligent, misunderstood, and perceived as ugly by most of the world. Physically I am not an ugly person but mentally, compared to societies standards I am hideous, a threat because I'm different and don't understand many common social concepts. In a way it made me dislike the rest of the human race even more than I already do, but I guess its majority rule and we are the minority so they get to say what goes. Mob rule, no different than violent savages that have intelligence but no concept of anything outside their little box view of reality. As intelligent as we are as a whole we sure as hell don't know how to actually think. Odd shape pieces don't fit the puzzle life and society are built on to quote a song.

The one question I had after seeing it was: If the aliens had been more cute and cuddly in appearance would they have gotten the same treatment?

 

[Ahava]

Excellent movie. I think many, many people (including myself) identify with the aliens. As sad as that may be. I walked out of the theatre despising humanity and all it supposedly stood for.

We live in a shallow society filled with people yearning to be beautiful and successful. Most people despise anything that is ugly or unsettling. If the aliens were cute, the trend would have continued. They would become a play-thing; the aura of a puppy dog. And, in all sincerity, assuming the aliens were adorable, humanity, in all of its gloriously greedy ways, would have sold them as pets.

 

[Invoke Ninja's True Power]

Excellent movie. I think many, many people (including myself) identify with the aliens. As sad as that may be. I walked out of the theatre despising humanity and all it supposedly stood for.

We live in a shallow society filled with people yearning to be beautiful and successful. Most people despise anything that is ugly or unsettling. If the aliens were cute, the trend would have continued. They would become a play-thing; the aura of a puppy dog. And, in all sincerity, assuming the aliens were adorable, humanity, in all of its gloriously greedy ways, would have sold them as pets.

I concur, although I did think the alien kid was kind of cute, kind of like a puppy or something along that line lol. I like how it had that element of realism, like if that scenario happened in real life it might not be much different. Of course there was the movie style over-dramatics, suspense, and safe at the last second but those things are required to get a more emotional response from the audience. I'm kind of glad I saved G.I Joe for after District 9. I was pleasantly surprised, I didn't despise humanity so much after that hahaha. the previews looked crappy

 

[Reverse Transcriptase]

I thought the main character was just absurd. He was so shallow... and that was kind of the point? But really- even at the end, after he sacrificed himself, I was pretty unimpressed. His character seems a bit too similar to Michael from the office.

The fact that the alien-apartheid happened in South Africa is so wonderfully ironic.

My brother was shocked at how the aliens were treated- but I pointed out the one line from the movie: "these were the workers, the unintelligent part of the species." That shed a lot of light for why the aliens acted so inappropriately- just stealing whatever they wanted. And really, aliens acting like that are pretty inappropriate, and should be locked away elsewhere.

In that situation I think I would have tried to find the leaders, or try to get the aliens to elect some kind of representation. Not that it would have any power, but at least there could be a more concise voice and figure for the aliens.

 

[Fedayeen]

is this related to district B 13 at all?

 

[Invoke Ninja's True Power]

I found all the human characters in the movie very abrasive and yes the main character was very annoying. But still, a lot of it I think was for cinematic effect. They were going for the apartheid parallel with the concept. I am probably going to see it again this week with some of my family since they have not seen it yet and I don't mind going to good movies more than once. It wouldn't surprise me in the least if District 10 comes out in 3 years. Definitely the surprise movie of the summer for me.

 

[Artifice Orisit]

Let me guess, a human saves the day?

Just watching the trailer made me think: MUST KILL JOHN CONNER.
(I'm still not over that, he f**king deserved to die)

 

[Sapphire Harp]

I just saw it and I thought the movie was absolutely brilliant... A far cry better than any sci-fi movie I can think of in the last 3-10 years... (I'll have to double check against a list later...)

I see why you guys are annoyed with the main character - definitely a very self-centered guy... but really, I think it was the most realistic choice of an individual for the film. A well-wishing individual, an idealist is not going to be working for the company he was working for... and especially not deeply involved in the organization... It just helped keep it realistic... otherwise it might have devolved into space opera... and that would have just been sad.

I was thinking about why the aliens were without any kind of leadership... and the only individuals with significant intelligence, skill, and initiative were working in secrecy... (It looked like secrecy from the other aliens as much as from the humans to me.)

My best guess is the situation looks like a mutiny of some kind might have happened... Perhaps the leadership caste divided into factions and wiped each other out? Or once the ball got rolling with killing the leadership, the drones just kept it going? It kind of makes sense to me...

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Hmmm - if they were cute and cuddly, I think the international effort to adopt the aliens would have been stronger... but I don't think most of Africa has any use for cute and cuddly. I bet that would have led to exploitation through selling them into slavery and/or exhibition.

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P.S. I was reading the wiki article on the film and this project was created when a film based on HALO died from rights conflicts... We are INCREDIBLYfortunate.
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Let me guess, a human saves the day?

P.P.S. Actually, Cog, while main human character does a very ethical thing and may save the day... the choice he makes might completely screw humanity in the long run... It's a highly debatable ending.
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[Invoke Ninja's True Power]

But was he human when he made the decision?

 

[Ahava]

But was he human when he made the decision?

You just blew my mind. Thank you.

And I agree, the alien kid was pretty cute.


(I'd add more but I'm still picking up the blown pieces of my mind).

 

[flow]

Wow, I can't lie... I thought it was one of the worst movies I've ever seen. I was not convinced by the stupidity of the humans nor the aliens. I couldn't relate to any characters, alien or human. I found the entire script to be ridiculously dumb, and the special effects did nothing for me. I'm more about acting then visuals, and perhaps that's why I found the movie to be so lackluster. I'd rate it a solid 1.5/5. Not for me. I'm glad others found something enjoyable out of it, I could only laugh at how ridiculously lowbrow the whole thing was.. oh, I'm turning into an alien and I've got three years to be turned back into a human, so I'll try to kill the one alien who could possibly know how to go about such transfiguration.. and then wing my way into an alien transformer, and then wing my way into commandeering an alien super-ship that has been mysteriously hovering over some random new jersey town for 20 years and seems to be inoperable until they find enough alien juice to fly it back to its home planet that has 7 moons. Sorry, I found the entire plot to be ridiculously nonsensical. To be fair though, I thought Peter Jackson's 'King Kong' was terrible too.

 

[Invoke Ninja's True Power]

what would you expect from a low budget film? For low budget I thought the special effects were pretty solid. The actors were unknowns, and sure, all the characters pissed me off. What I did like was it seemed to have an element of realism to me. The general attitudes, the closed mindedness. The main character was an idiot and I think the "smart" alien just said he could change the guy back to human to get his help and to embrace the fact that he isn't going to be human again anytime soon. Also wouldn't surprise me if a District 10 comes out in 3 years from now to coincide with this. All in all its just another movie, but at least it gave me something entertaining to do on a hot/humid summer day with no power. Sure as hell beat sitting around the house and it actually made me think. bonus

 

[Cavallier]

"District 9" A cautionary tale of what happens if you're a twit. I so badly wanted somebody to gut the bastard. But NOOOO!!! He had to go for the epic Greek tragic hero bit. God what an idiot!

Okay, let me ask you all this: You're put on a ship (presumably either due to some last ditch effort to leave a dying planet or as a colonization party...one million? Probably not the latter reason) and you end up finally reaching your destination only to starve half to death trapped inside said ship. Then you finally get released and shoved onto a planet we can only hope does not have any adverse physical or neurological effects on you. You get rounded up by the local fauna who have a long and illustrious history of violently degrading anything different from themselves. Now you're half starved and stuck in a civilization where you don't understand a damn thing. Let's keep in mind when humans are placed in a group its collective intelligence tends to drop to it's lowest common denominator. If we assume that the aliens in this movie are not unlike humans than we are looking at a recipe for complete barbaric Kaos with a capital K.

If I were put in this situation and I had the key to saving my ass (and everyone's for that matter) by some incredibly complicated procedure that might take years...Yeah, I'd probably keep it to myself because my "compatriots" have all become a bunch of babbling opportunistic idiots. It would be hard for me to even think that anyone I confided in wouldn't turn around and betray me either for their own benefit or out of stupidity. I certainly couldn't/wouldn't trust anybody with my safety. Hell, even now in a fairly civilized country where I get to eat as many square meals a day as I want and most people get to sleep in a warm bed I still don't trust strangers when I'm walking home at night.

My point? Well, frankly I think the movie had a few plot holes, I hated the main character, but the stupidity and immediate descent into chaos and violence seemed depressingly true to life.

 

[Deleted member 1424]

I hated the main character utterly, but it was good, moving hate. His whole purpose was to be hated and despised. Frankly they did a great job with it. They vilified the humans and victimized the aliens (quite the turn around from the usual). Also as you can tell by my avatar I also deeply approve of the 'equal rights for sentient beings' theme.

I thought it was interesting how they forced the aliens to take human names; akin to how they used to have immigrants change theirs. I found Christopher's character very compelling. I imagine in the normal 'prawn' society more intelligent individuals like him would play benevolent shepherds to the rest of their society. I also found it interesting that Christopher only had one child, when the abortion scene indicated they usually had more than one at a time. Does more effort and time go into developing an intelligent individualistic prawn? The kid was quite awesome in his own right too. Adorable, yet dangerous with the right technology.

...but what exactly was the deal with the cat food?

 

[Mr.W]

Spoilers, ahoy.

As Adair said, you really aren't supposed to like the main character. He's meant to be a selfish pencil pusher thrown into a situation completely out of his control where survival rests solely on abandoning his selfishness, and only by becoming one of the aliens is he able do so.

I thought the first half of the movie was a great commentary on xenophobia while the second half was a great chase/action film. Plot holes aside, I loved it the whole way through and it certainly didn't hurt being at a midnight screening filled with people roaring and cheering at every absurd death (death by gravity gun pig, anybody?).
The only issue I had was with the aliens being so similar to humans emotionally. Human-like aliens never really sit well with me as I don't see that being a reality. Certainly it's possible of course, but how likely would it be that our first contact with intelligent life be with aliens so similar to us in terms of our emotional palette. It was necessary to help us sympathize with them of course, but regardless, I found my eyes rolling at times. That's not to say I didn't absolutely love this film though.

 

[RubberDucky451]

Interesting....

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/21/movies/21arts-NIGERIASAYSD_BRF.html?bl

 

[Decaf]

I found the movie to be fascinating. I admired the direction and the interplay between CGI characters with live. They always found a way around difficult shooting problems in ways that fit with the action, and that's nothing to sneeze at. Because of those things it was easy to reserve my suspension of belief for the human characters.

In contrast to how many of you feel, I thought the disparate elements of the story came together nicely. The main characters acted as more of a backdrop and the story as more of a foreground, but I thought it worked.

--Spoiler--

Personally, my favorite part of the movie could be summed up in the the anti-aircraft missle hitting the command shuttle. This is the first time I'd seem a movie that took technology so seriously that it played it straight regardless of plot difficulties. Not that all the holes were filled it, but technology itself wasn't neglected like I'm used to (shout out to silent space travel in Firefly).

Aside from what I simply appreciated, I enjoyed the movie. It won't be one I think back on like Usual Suspects, but I would certainly watch it again.

Interesting....

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/21/movies/21arts-NIGERIASAYSD_BRF.html?bl

Hey, people are going to be offended by whatever they want. I didn't walk away from the theater thinking anything negative about Nigerians. Hell, I didn't even remember they WERE Nigerians until that article reminded me. Maybe that's cold of me, and maybe I'd feel differently if I were part of a group that was portrayed negatively in film, but aside from being a raging INTP and an atheist, I'm a white, young male. This forum is the only group I have ever felt the least bit of kinship with. If someone portrayed INTPs as villains or cannibals, I would assume they had a pretty good reason to want to take over the world or eat that guy over there <shrug>

Yes, I'm a little tipsy...