District 9 (2009)
E.T. for Adults
We’re baaaAAAAAAaaaaack. After a brief hiatus to celebrate the holidays and enjoy #honeymonth, we’re getting back into the swing of things with a … (checks notes) … sci-fi movie about xenophobia towards aliens? Sure why not.
Previews
What, if anything, did we know about this coming attraction before we watched it?
Ellen: Aliens. South Africa. Social commentary. That’s just about everything I know about District 9. Based on the number of guns we saw from the movie at Weta Workshop, I’m going to guess that I should add violence to the list.
Tyler: Hey I’ve actually seen this one! As some of you know (because I’m very eager to share) I studied abroad in South Africa, where this movie takes place. While over there, our program leader thought watching a modern movie would be a fun way for us to learn about our temporary home. Granted, that was now almost eleven years ago, so I don’t remember too much about the plot details, but I do remember enjoying it. Time to see if that’s still true all these years later.
Plots & Feelings
This one’s pretty self-explanatory.
Short Version (courtesy of IMDb): Violence ensues after an extraterrestrial race forced to live in slum-like conditions on Earth finds a kindred spirit in a government agent exposed to their biotechnology.
Long Version (modified from Wikipedia and formatted to fit your screen):
Welcome to Johannesburg, South Africa. An alternate universe Johannesburg, to be more precise. In a documentary-style series of news clips and interviews, we learn that in 1982, a giant ship appeared over the city. The military eventually cut their way in to discover one million ailing, malnourished aliens. A camp was set up for them outside of town, and as the next 20 years progressed, it became a slum known as District 9. The “Prawns” and Johannesburgians don’t necessarily get along all that well, with each side resentful of the other, leading to riots and violence. The slum also boasts a strong criminal element, run by a group of opportunistic Nigerians who deal largely in cat food (a treat the Prawns love) and weapons. Oh by the way, humans can’t use alien weaponry. That probably won’t come up again.
In case you want a spelling of our protagonist’s name (Source) Ellen: The interviews with locals make clear that many of them see the aliens as filthy and ignorant, so the social commentary comes in hot right from the beginning.
Tyler: I believe one of the exact quotes was “At least they're keeping them separate from us,” which really says a lot without saying a lot.
A bumbling, mild-mannered Multinational United (MNU) employee named Wikus van de Merwe is appointed by his powerful father-in-law Smit to lead a government relocation effort of the Prawns to a new facility 200 km away from town. In theory Wikus is nice enough, but his deep-rooted bias and feeling of superiority to the aliens is evident in, well, everything he does and says. Documentarians follow Wikus and his second-in-command Fundiswa into the District as they attempt to get the inhabitants to sign their eviction notices. The condescension and outright disrespect is palpable. They’re backed up by heavily-armed MNU “cowboys” because oh, did we mention they’re primarily a weapons manufacturer?? This footage is intercut with interviews with Wikus’ friends and family and other experts. They speak of Wikus in the past tense, and his wife Tania talks about how he used to make her things. Everyone makes vague references to “what happened” and “what he did,” so now we’re just waiting for that shoe to drop.
As the fairly violent eviction process continues, we meet alien Christopher Johnson1, his young son CJ, and their friend Paul. They’re scouring the local dumps for alien tech and a fluid that can be extracted from it. It’s taken them 20 years to fill a tube, and it’s vital the humans don’t find it. Naturally, that’s when Wikus shows up! He gets immediately flustered when Christopher informs him this eviction without notice is illegal, and ends up searching his shack, which is full of salvaged computers and other technology. Paul resists and one of the main human goons, Koobus, shoots him in the head. Meanwhile, Wikus finds the canister of fluid and accidentally sprays it in his own face. He’s flung from the hovel and led away to be treated. He appears to be deteriorating rapidly; his fingernails are popping off and he cannot stop sweating. What better time for there to be a surprise party at his house! Friends and family are there to celebrate his promotion, and Wikus puts on a brave face until he vomits all over his cake2 and passes out.
Wikus is summarily zipped into a body bag and hauled off to a sketchy MNU basement lab where they are conducting horrifying experiments on Prawns. They remove the field dressing on Wikus’ arm and OOOPS it’s a claw now. He’s still deeply unwell and out of it, but with the use of a shock rod, Wikus is forced to start shooting at pigs using alien weapons with his newly-clawed hand. And it works! The last experiment forces him to shoot and disintegrate a live Prawn, despite his protests. These weapons are bloody and brutal, y’all. Wikus’ transformation is progressing rapidly, and the “doctors” want to dissect him for anything they can gather, because governments and private companies the world over would pay top dollar to be able to use alien tech. Smit, Wikus’ dang father-in-law, is like, “yeah do it, I’ll go lie to my daughter about what happened.”
Tyler: Similar to how Disney is able to brilliantly forge emotional connections between its audience and non-human characters (e.g., animals, Star Wars droids3, etc.), District 9 does a great job at making you care about that sacrificial prawn in its brief amount of screentime, with its eyes doing a lot of the work.
Wikus isn’t going down so easily, however, and he manages to escape! Our resident caricature of evil Koobus is sent to go find him. Wikus attempts to lay low and get food from his favorite greasy fast food place, but ruh-roh: the disinformation campaign is in full swing! A TV in the shop plays a news bulletin alleging that Wikus is undergoing a transformation due to illegal breeding with Prawns, and there’s even a number to call: 0-800-STOP-WIKUS. He hides the only place a partially-mutated human4 can: District 9. More specifically, he ends up in Christopher’s house! He’s got a transport ship hidden underneath, but needs the canister to fuel it. The alien quickly realizes only one thing could have done this to a human, and despite well-earned distrust, agrees to use the fluid to help heal Wikus back up at the mothership. First, though, he must help steal it back from MNU. Wikus dismisses the task as impossible and leaves to go sulk. Smit and Koobus track him via a very obvious phone call from Tania, so with no other choice, he returns to Chris and begins planning their probable suicide mission.
Tyler: Wikus very much needs some time to process wtf is happening to him, clearly not recognizing that he’s in a movie.
You can’t try to breach an MNU secret lab 4 stories underground empty-handed, so it’s off to the Nigerans for guns! The leader is like, “sure sure sure cool cool cool, I’m going to need to eat your arm first,” believing it will give him the power to use Prawn tech. Wikus manages to grab a blaster and escapes with a bag of tricks. Cue Koobus and his goons moving in, and Wikus absolutely obliterates a dude, rightly freaking Christopher out. They proceed to the lab, blasting their way through, and Wikus kills a whole bunch of people, tbh. They make it to the lab, and while Wikus finds the tube, Chris is transfixed by a dissected Paul. They manage to escape via the old toss-a-bomb-at-the-wall trick and peel off in a stolen truck, pursued by more trucks and choppers.
Tyler: The *splat* spray that occurs when humans are hit with the alien weaponry is somehow gnarly in the best and worst possible ways. It’s amazing how used to it I got, though: when we watched the human carnage that is John Wick the next night, I half-expected his victims to go splat.
Ellen: I’m sure the brutality is the point, but… yikes.
The fugitives make it back to Chris’ home, and CJ leaps into action to activate the ship. Chris explains to Wikus that it’ll take a bit longer to fix him than they hoped, but he’ll be back in three years! He’s horrified by what he saw and wants to use all of the fuel to take the mothership back to their home to sound the alarm. Wikus doesn’t care for that answer, so he knocks Christopher out and hops into the ship. It starts to fly but is immediately hit with an MNU missile. CJ hides in the ship, and Wikus is caught up in a vicious firefight between the Nigerian faction and MNU. He manages to climb into an alien mech-suit, and meanwhile, huh, I wonder why the mothership is moving? CJ is activating alien technology all over town, positioning the mothership over his downed spacecraft. Christopher is captured, and Wikus doesn’t help him immediately. Eventually, his humanity gets the better of him, and he blasts the MNU yahoos out of the way using the suit, giving Chris time to run. He promises to be back.
Tyler: Regarding Wikus’ change of heart to help out Chris: I read a review somewhere that noted the irony of Wikus’ transformation into a Prawn making him more human (an interpretation I like), which this and the following scenes seem to support.
Ellen: I agree with that take, but if you want to be cynical, you could argue that Wikus’ emotional humanity only extends as far as the species with which he currently identifies. As a human, he was complicit in a lot of Prawn murder. As a mostly-Prawn, he sure is killing a lot of humans.
Inside the ship, Christopher and CJ activate the mothership tractor beam, which brings them up, up, and away! Koobus tries to stop them via rocket launcher, but Wikus catches the projectile in the most badass move of his life. His suit has taken heavy fire at this point, and it eventually spits him out into the dust. His transformation is really progressing, and one of his eyes is now bulging in a way that will haunt this author’s nightmares. Koobus looms over him, giving a full-on villain speech, and thus he fails to notice the other aliens moving in on him. They literally rip him apart.
Back in the documentary footage, they say there’s no way of knowing in what manner Christopher Johnson will return, if at all. Fundiswa is in jail for whistle-blowing on the MNU genetics program, and the Prawns have been relocated to District 10, as planned. Tania still holds onto the hope that Wikus will come home, and she finds a salvaged metal flower on her doorstep one day.
Intermission
Even though ILTBTA is free, please indulge us further and enjoy this quick “advertisement.”
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Wiki-Wiki-Whaaat?
Love a good Wikipedia rabbit hole in search of some fun facts? Us too.
District 9’s Wikipedia page has some interesting facts and anecdotes that we recommend you read through, but here are a few of our favorites:
District 9 was based on a short film called Alive in Joburg, which along with District 9 was written and directed by Neill Blomkamp. Alive in Joburg is shot in a similar style to the beginning of District 9, with “news clips” and interviews with locals and alien “experts.” In reality, all of the interview statements from locals were from actual interviews with South Africans asked about their opinions of Zimbabwean and Nigerian refugees.
The film is inspired by the actual events around District Six, an area of Cape Town in which over 60,000 of its (almost entirely) non-white inhabitants were forcibly removed by the apartheid government in the 1970s. Sadly, it was also influenced by some post-apartheid evictions across the country.
Sharlto Copley, who plays Wikus van der Merwe, made his feature film debut in District 9. He has known director Neil Blomkamp since they were teenagers, and he has appeared in several of Blomkamp’s other films.
The slur “prawn” used to describe the aliens is a reference to the Parktown prawn, a species of large cricket that is considered a pest in South Africa. Coincidentally, the Parktown prawn is related to the New Zealand Tree wētā, namesake of the Weta Workshop who worked on the film’s visual effects. (Keen ILTBTA readers will recall that we visited Weta Workshop during our honeymoon.)
The alien homes were actually recently evacuated impoverished housing units in a suburb of Johannesburg.
Due to its portrayal of Nigerian characters, District 9 was banned in Nigeria.
Oscar NomNomNomz
Since we all know a movie is nothing without the food and drink it incorporates.
It’s now time to award the Oscar for Best Snacktor in a Supporting Role5. And the nomnomnominees are:
Cat food from an MNU agent
Lollipop “sweetie” from Wikus
Cake from Wikus' promotion party
And the Oscar goes to … cat food! Unfortunately, the cat food was immediately stolen and devoured by Wikus, so we will accept this award on its behalf.
Fill In The Blank
How did we really feel about The Academy nominating this?
Ellen: I’d like to give the Academy some cat food, assuming they’re into that kind of thing. I really enjoyed the style of this movie. The “documentary” footage really worked for me, and I was hooked wondering how it all played out and what happened to Wikus. That being said, wow I hated Wikus. I understand that the point is how even “nice” people can treat those they see as beneath them horribly, and he experiences both growth and a kind of comeuppance for that. But I hate him and remain unmoved on that. It’s a deeply effective social commentary that teeters on the edge of the level of gore I can handle, and I’ll be thinking about it for a long time.
Tyler: I’d like to give the Academy a congratulatory cake and hope they don’t vomit and fall onto it. I was admittedly unsure if I’d enjoy this as much as I did when I first watched it a decade ago, but I’m happy to report that it held up well. I really appreciate unique approaches to storytelling, and the documentary style was an extremely clever way to explain the universe and instill some tension regarding what exactly happened to Wikus. I also found the story to be intriguing, the action well-paced, and the alien costumes/effects to be incredible.
Aside from the movie itself, I’d also like to commend the Academy for the increase in Best Picture nominees, which went into effect during the movie season that District 9 was a part of. It allows for extremely worthy recognition of more atypical, non-Oscar-baity-drama movies, such as Avatar, Inglorious Basterds, and Up, all of which were also nominated with District 9. It also gives us an excuse to go to the movies more, so thanks!
Let The Credits Roll
Thanks for reading! Some quick housekeeping as you exit the theatre:
If you have plots and feelings of your own (on the movie or ILTBTA in general), feel free to comment on the post or simply reply to the email. If you liked reading this: tell your friends! If you hated reading this: tell your friends how much you hated it by forwarding it to them!
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If you’d like to start a wild Best Picture journey of your own, feel free to download a copy of The Spreadsheet. Bonus: checking off the boxes is oddly satisfying.
Post-Credits Scene
Get a sneak peek at the next ILTBTA installment. And, yes, some more #honeymonth pictures.
With our next post falling on Valentine’s Day, we figured a nice rom-com was in order. Enter: Moonstruck, a 1987 rom-com starring Cher and Nicolas Cage as a widow and her fiance’s younger brother with whom she falls in love. Moonstruck is available to rent from all the usual places.
Until then, love thy neighbor!
P.S. Read on for the thrilling conclusion to our honeymoon recap.
Question: what’s better than one wine tour on your honeymoon? Two wine tours, where the second also includes gin! We spent our first full day in Melbourne bringing down the average age on yet another tour, visiting a couple wineries and the Four Pillars Gin distillery. Shout out to the retired British woman on our tour who, after downing the tasting flight, ordered and subsequently downed a glass of their 58.8% ABV (!) Navy Strength gin.
Our next day was full of animals, with stops at the Moonlit Sanctuary to see some local wildlife and Phillip Island for the famous Penguin Parade!
On our last night, we snuck in a(nother) trip to the movies to see Avatar: The Way of Water, unknowingly checking off another Best Picture nominee for this year. Before we knew it, it was time for the last leg of the trip: Sydney!
Little did we know, we saved the best city for last. Sydney was a beautiful city with everything a tourist could ever want: beautiful beaches …
a ferry through a beautiful harbor that was not only connected to its easy-to-use public transit system, but also took you to more beaches …
… beautiful movie theatres (we saw Babylon) …
… along with beautiful parks, gardens, food, cocktail bars, people, and architecture that we did not take many pictures of. Overall, while it started off with some … unwelcome travel adventures, our honeymoon certainly ended with some unforgettable ones too. Thus concludes #honeymonth.
P.P.S. Go Birds.
AKA Christopher Prawn-son
What is this, Babylon? Or Triangle of Sadness? Man, 2022 was gross.
Ellen: BB-8 is my friend and I love him.
Sounds like my ex-wife!
Results tabulated and certified by the accountants at Ernst & Yum™.