District 9

[Aonaran]

blatant racist.

Considering it's a satire of the Apartheid system, that's kind of the whole point.

So depicting the Nigerians as beast-like cannibals who can only function in the world to kill, steal, perform voodoo, screech like monkeys and motor around in cheetah paited trucks...I guess that was for da laffs.

"allegory,"

I think you might actually know less about allegory than the director. If it is about Apartheid and takes place in Africa and there is literal Apartheid taking place in the story, IT IS NOT AN ALLEGORY. And again, if your message is "Apartheid is bad, ya'll" then don't depict your aliens ( you know the ones that represent the black folk ) as hive minded savages. And even the depiction of CHRISTopher was condescending as he was more of the "Noble Savage" type. And then there is the aforementioned depiction of the literal black folk, which is to say the least problematic. Fail.

[Manoil]

Damn, sucka.

[Wolfman Walt]

So depicting the Nigerians as beast-like cannibals who can only function in the world to kill, steal, perform voodoo, screech like monkeys and motor around in cheetah paited trucks

Dumb question - how do we not know this is how Nigerian Warlords and their gangs act like? Please do not confuse the two with all Nigerian people as it was spelled out that these were the private gang of a warlord who is trying to aquire money by taking advantage of the situation.

[Aonaran]

Dumb question - how do we not know this is how Nigerian Warlords and their gangs act like? Please do not confuse the two with all Nigerian people as it was spelled out that these were the private gang of a warlord who is trying to aquire money by taking advantage of the situation.

I somehow doubt the overarching goal of the film was social realism. Still, lets assume for a second that Neil Bloomcamp is right and Nigerians are in fact subhuman and genetically predisposed to crime. Is it still not problematic to depict them as such in a film that is theoretically anti-apartheid? And then there is the "allegorical" use of the aliens to represent the blacks of South Africa. Again, subhuman beasts. Again, problematic. Fail.

[Retlaw83]

I somehow doubt the overarching goal of the film was social realism. Still, lets assume for a second that Neil Bloomcamp is right and Nigerians are in fact subhuman and genetically predisposed to crime.

Couldn't you apply that to any movie in which some people are the bad guys? "Oh, look at Godfather. It's saying Italians are pre-disposed to crime and are all greasy goombas."

And then there is the "allegorical" use of the aliens to represent the blacks of South Africa. Again, subhuman beasts. Again, problematic. Fail.

The aliens aren't portrayed as subhuman - aside from diet, they're portrayed like the poor uneducated blacks were treated. Those shacks the aliens live in are part of what they call a township - and lots of real people lived there and probably still do. And that scene with the convoy rolling at the beginning happened a lot in real life - the South African Police Force would roll in in their Caspirs and support vehicles, but instead of evicting people or personally brutalizing them, they'd open up the firing ports and start blasting protesters.

The movie is not a direct comparison; it's political satire. The aliens were made to look barely worthwhile because that's how the South African government viewed blacks during Apartheid. That treatment then extended to the education available to them, their work opportunities, all sorts of travel restrictions - and before you knew it, you ended up with a group of poor sods who were barely worthwhile through no fault of their own.

[Wolfman Walt]

Honestly, I think Retlaw is the only one here (that I know of) who can make accurate comparisons between real life and the commentary of the movie.

[Aonaran]

The thing is, everything retlaw said is immediately apparent by watching the film, it wasn't exactly subtle. Despite being just about as heavy handed as it could be, the film undermined what it was trying to say with its racial depictions . Aliens - hive minded beasts that eat raw meat and cat food and don't understand how society functions. Nigerians - hive minded beasts who eat people, aliens and human/alien hybrids and have no idea how to function in society. I'm from the United States, that doesn't make Indian Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull a great film should I decide to deem it so.

[Retlaw83]

Aliens - hive minded beasts that eat raw meat and cat food and don't understand how society functions.

Lack of education that could have been provided by their leaders/the humans had nothing to do with that right? You're acting as if the aliens were racially incapable of complex thought and no one amongst their species could figure out how to make an interstellar spaceship. That's where your insistence that all the aliens are portrayed as savages falls apart.

Nigerians - hive minded beasts who eat people, aliens and human/alien hybrids and have no idea how to function in society.

So because they focused on a very small group of Nigerians who were fucked up, and went out of their way in the heavy-handed way of the movie to say this particular group of people is fucked up, you read that to mean all Nigerians are fucked up? Did you watch the Godfather and assume all Italians were the mob, watch American Gangster and assume all black Americans are involved in the heroine trade, then watch Indiana Jones then assume all college professors go on dangerous adventures in search of ancient artifacts?

Finally, I'm not defending the movie because it's South African; I merely lived there, I'm not from there. I'm defending the movie because you're claiming it makes claims it doesn't - you're either stupid enough to let movies influence you to the degree that you think specific examples of people is a statement about all the people, or you just want to spout off on some kind of agenda.

By the way, you'll also notice the movie portraying South Africans as living in racial harmony - if you think a dumb Afrikaaner like Wikus would go around hugging black guys and treating them as friends in the real South Africa, you know nothing.

[Wolfman Walt]

then watch Indiana Jones then assume all college professors go on dangerous adventures in search of ancient artifacts?

God knows when I was in college, I took all of Doctor Jones' classes. What? It was an easy A. You'd go to class for like three weeks and his dad would suddenly bust into class and go "INDY!" and then he'd just pass us all.

[Manoil]

Oh, Junior!

[S4ur0n27]

Jeez, Susan. It's only 4.5 posts daily until December 31st. It's totally doable.

I'm losing it

NB: Gretzky sucks.

[VasikkA]

I'm losing it

NB: Gretzky sucks.

That's not what Gretzky would say.

[Smiley]

Finally a movie that isn't(completely) hollywood. I loved it. Apart from the "go on without me" scene which was a pure jackson moment, and tickled my gag-reflex.

[Manoil]

Still wanna see it. Dunno if I'll choose it over the new Mike Judge movie coming out on friday, though-- it's up in the air at this point

[cazsim83]

So depicting the Nigerians as beast-like cannibals who can only function in the world to kill, steal, perform voodoo, screech like monkeys and motor around in cheetah paited trucks

Dumb question - how do we not know this is how Nigerian Warlords and their gangs act like? Please do not confuse the two with all Nigerian people as it was spelled out that these were the private gang of a warlord who is trying to aquire money by taking advantage of the situation.

Why didn't he just set up an email scheme like all the other upstanding Nigerian warlords? This just seemed unnecessary.

[Aonaran]

The movie is not a direct comparison

You do realize the film is based shit that took place in Capetown's "District 6" in the 1970s, right? I'd call that a pretty direct comparison. The Aliens represent the blacks and they are depicted as dumb, hive-minded beasts. There isn't some a montage of failed schools and education systems in the ham-fisted docu-exposition so lets just judge the film by, I dunno, what is actually in it. And it really wouldn't have been difficult to make the Nigerians even vaguely human in motive by developing their intentions rather than having them simply exist as chaotic evil.


To quote a friend:

The big issue with the Nigerian gangs in this is Apartheid caused South African gangs. But rather than contend with the legacy of Apartheid, Blomcunt cops out and makes them from a different nation, all the while making the blacks and whites in the bureaucracy buddy buddy.

Also the Coppola thing is bullshit, Coppola was of the same ethnic group and the film served as a critique of the concept of America as a land of opportunity. It isn't saying the immigrant Italians are criminals, it is saying the underworld was the only option for a society still willing to cling to its cultural roots.

[Retlaw83]

The movie is not a direct comparison

You do realize the film is based shit that took place in Capetown's "District 6" in the 1970s, right? I'd call that a pretty direct comparison. The Aliens represent the blacks and they are depicted as dumb, hive-minded beasts.

You do realize the movie is political satire, right? The aliens are depicted as dumb, hive-minded beasts to reinforce the absurdity of what happened in real life.

Also the Coppola thing is bullshit, Coppola was of the same ethnic group

That argument falls flat on it's face because Blomkamp is South African and was around for the tail-end of Apartheid. Also, it's understandable that he would go with foreign gangsters instead of South African ones - the blacks and whites being buddy-buddy is part of the satire because in a fully functioning, normal country, that's typical how things are. The hope of quite a few South Africans is things can eventually become like that; at the end, the majority of white peoples' feelings towards blacks had nothing to do with skin color. It had to do with the fact the Apartheid system had turned most of them into little more than hive-minded beasts - ever hear of self-fulfilling prophecy? - and you couldn't trust any of them lest you ended up robbed, raped or murdered. I'm not saying that there weren't decent blacks, I'm saying the system was designed to strip humanity away at so many levels, and the people so desperate, that many basic interactions could cost you your life.

South Africans of all races have xenophobia for other African countries bred into them, even under the new government. They view themselves as more civilized because the only thing holding them back from being a first-world country is everyone being educated - and you just need to give that two or three generations to sort out. Using Nigerian gangsters would play better in South African theaters (which is really who this movie is made for at a cultural level) and not undermine the racial harmony aspect of the satire. And when you come down to it, it's just a movie and movies need interesting bad guys.

The legitimate question about the Nigerian gangsters is not if they were a cop out, but is the portrayal of the Nigerians a result of South African cultural bias or merely part of the satire?

[Kashluk]

I haven't seen District 9 (yet), but I believe that Somali pirates would've been awesome. And slave-traders of Chad / Sudan are pretty hard-core as well. Sure, they are geographically a bit far-fetched, but it's the movies anyways, so it doesn't matter!

[Wolfman Walt]

The fact that this movie has accomplished such a deep discussion about it's topics makes it a success in it's goals wether people want to admit it or not. I can't remember the last time a serious world issue was discussed as much because of a movie on here. Sure, it's basically between two people, but that's one person more than we ussually have being serious.

[St. Toxic]

Saw it stoned. Worked pretty well.