I”m not a great movie goer.
In another unexpected turn, I attended a movie yesterday. So far this has been a big movie year for me – two. I was a raving fan of Star Trek which restored the luster of the original TV series much damaged by the movie adaptations over the years. So what brought me to District 9?
Well, Peter Jackson attracted my attention- although his over-special-effected King Kong left me cold. I did also hear that the special effects were minimal and several critics liked it. I had remarked to my son that I would be interested but never until today did I have the time. I was surprised that it was still playing.
We shared the theater with four others and settled in for what I hoped would be a good experience.
So what’s the deal with District 9?
It’s filmed- at least at first like a documentary – with news clips of the geeky main character who seems a typical know-nothing bureaucrat put in charge of relocating over one million alien ‘prawns’ stranded over Johannesburg when their space ship runs out of gas. Well-meaning South Africans break into the ship to rescue the one million (hard to abelieve that number on a ship) starving crew and relocate them to a shanty town outside Jo’berg. (OK the logic here doesn’t compute but I have been through much worse movie set-ups.)
I won’t give away the story but if you haven’t seen it and it’s still playing, I recommend that you see it.
Nothing is by the numbers with District 9
I was giving up about one third through because it seemed to be a predictable plot line but then everything got crazy. At each turn the plot went a completely different direction from the cliche movie plot expectations and the main character becomes a heroic figure- as much to his surprise as anyone else.
If you are sick of stale plots and predictable conclusions, you owe it to yourself to be surprised and delighted with a movie you can’t second guess. Don’t be misled, it still has the evil multinational organization and the military hard noses. You can’t expect a movie to totally eliminate stereotypes.
Just enough special effects to get the job done– and no more!
And one other plus. They told the story without going crazy with special effects. Lately it seems that the quality of a movie is inversely related to the amount of money invested in special effects.
So, if you hate cartoons and special effects marathons, get to the theater and vote with your ticket for a real movie – District 9
I had been wanting to see District-9, I too was an avid fan of Star Trek and hope it revitalizes the series.
Dragon Blogger,
I was hoping we’d see a sequel to both movies by now.
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Wow, responded almost a year later to my comment 🙂 Yeah I would have hoped there would have been sequels. Check out TNT Falling Skies show, very District 9 like in a way about Alien Invasion, I thought it was pretty good.
Sorry about that. I must have been asleep at the switch. Clearly you aren’t. Thanks for the suggestions. Most of my TV watching is with my wife who is not a Sci Fi fan so I’m not sure it will work out.
Ah, my wife is no sci-fi fan either but she hung in there with Falling Skies and liked the story and element behind it. She did not like District-9 or most other sci-fi films.
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District 9 was some great science-fiction. A new twist on the aliens landing and attempting conquest of the earth type of thing; so over done.
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Amazing. District 9 was one of my few visits to a movie theatre recently. I’m burned out with the special effects blockbusters.
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