District 9
Encyclopedia
District 9 is a 2009 South Africa
n science fiction
thriller film directed by Neill Blomkamp
. It was written by Blomkamp and Terri Tatchell
, and produced by Peter Jackson
and Carolynne Cunningham. The film stars Sharlto Copley
, Jason Cope
, and David James
. The film won the 2010 Saturn Award
for Best International Film presented by the Academy of Science Fiction, Fantasy & Horror Films, and was nominated for four Academy Awards
in 2010, including Best Picture
, Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Visual Effects, and Best Editing.
The story, adapted from Alive in Joburg
, a 2005 short film directed by Blomkamp and produced by Sharlto Copley and Simon Hansen
, pivots on the themes of xenophobia
and social segregation
. The title and premise of District 9 were inspired by events that took place in District Six, Cape Town
during the apartheid era. The film was produced for $30 million and shot on location in Chiawelo, Soweto
, presenting fictional interviews, news footage, and video from surveillance cameras in a part-mock documentary
style format. A viral marketing
campaign began in 2008, at the San Diego Comic-Con, while the theatrical trailer appeared in July 2009. Released by TriStar Pictures
, the film opened to critical acclaim on August 14, 2009, in North America and earned $37 million in its opening weekend. Many saw the film as a sleeper hit
for its relatively unknown cast and modest-budget production, while achieving success and popularity during its theatrical run.
spacecraft comes to Earth and hovers motionless above Johannesburg
in South Africa
. After three months of no contact and no signs of activity, a team enters the ship, discovering a large group of sick and malnourished extraterrestrials, who are then given food, shelter, and health-care on Earth. The aliens, derogatorily referred to by some locals as "prawn
s", are confined to District 9, a government camp inside Johannesburg. Following their settlement, periodic unrest occurs between aliens and locals.
In the first decade of the 21st century, the South African government hires Multinational United (MNU), a private military company
under the direction of its CEO, Dirk Michaels (William Allen Young
), to relocate the aliens to the new District 10. In August 2010, Wikus van de Merwe (Sharlto Copley
), an Afrikaner
bureaucrat
, is appointed by Piet Smit (Dirk Minnaar), an MNU executive and his father-in-law, to lead the relocation with the serving of illegal eviction notices.
Meanwhile, three aliens (Christopher Johnson (Jason Cope
), his son, and a friend), search for alien technology from which they distill a mysterious fluid, storing it in a small canister. Later, while raiding the shack of Christopher's friend, Wikus discovers and seizes the container, which sprays an unidentified substance onto his face. Christopher's friend is subsequently killed by Koobus Venter (David James
), a xenophobic soldier leading the operation.
The mysterious fluid makes Wikus ill and begins to turn his DNA and body into those of a "prawn". MNU finds out and they force Wikus to test various alien weapons which only function when used by an alien; he succeeds at using them. The MNU scientists then decide to vivisect Wikus' organs because they are deemed to be worth billions for biotech research, but he overpowers his captors and escapes. Smit lies to the press, saying that Wikus is infected with an alien STD
and is highly contagious. He also sends Venter and his men to capture him.
Wikus finds refuge in District 9 and seeks help from Christopher, who reveals that the canister would allow him to reactivate the dormant mothership and reverse Wikus' mutation. He then reveals the lost command-module hidden under his shack, and agrees to help Wikus if he retrieves the canister from MNU. Wikus agrees and steals weapons from Nigerian arms-dealer Obesandjo and his gang.
Wikus and Christopher break into the MNU offices and successfully retrieve the canister; they flee back to District 9, with MNU forces in pursuit. Outraged by illegal experiments he saw at the MNU headquarters, Christopher tells Wikus that he will need to seek help for the other aliens before curing him. Unfortunately, the trip to the alien planet and back will take three years. Enraged, Wikus attacks Christopher, then hijacks the command module. Soon after takeoff, the craft is shot down and crashes. Venter and his men arrest Wikus and Christopher, but Obesandjo's gang ambushes the MNU convoy, kills the guards, and after an intense firefight, Wikus is taken to Obesandjo, who believes that by eating Wikus' mutated alien hand he will gain the ability to use alien weaponry. Obesandjo's base is then surrounded and besieged by MNU and a firefight ensues.
In the downed command module, Christopher's son activates the mothership and an alien mechanized battle suit which, upon detecting a threat to Wikus, kills Obesandjo and his men before they can butcher Wikus. Wikus takes control of the battle suit and rescues Christopher, shielding Christopher as they run to the command module and killing many MNU men firing upon them. Wikus then aids Christopher's escape by staying behind and holding off the MNU troops in his ailing mechanized battle suit. Wikus kills all the troops except Venter, who cripples his suit and forces it to eject him. He is cornered by Venter, who tells him he plans to execute him to prevent further repercussions. However, a group of aliens surround Venter and tear him to pieces before eating what remains. Christopher promises to return in three years and leaves in the mothership with his son as Johannesburg's residents celebrate its departure.
A series of interviews and news broadcasts are shown, with people theorizing about Wikus' whereabouts. MNU's illegal experiments on the aliens are uncovered and exposed by Fundiswa Mhlanga, Wikus' former trainee, who is incarcerated and awaiting trial on a false charge of corporate espionage. District 9 is completely demolished, with all the aliens having been moved to the new larger District 10 240 km (149.1 mi) outside the city. Wikus' wife, Tania (Vanessa Haywood), reveals the finding of a metal flower on her doorstep, which gives her hope that her husband is still alive. Interviews are given implying whether or not Christopher's return will either mean reconciling Earth and the Prawns, or war declaration against humans. The film ends with a shot of a fully transformed Wikus crafting a similar flower in a scrapyard.
planned to produce a film adaptation based on the Halo
video game franchise with first-time director Neill Blomkamp
. Due to a lack of financing, the Halo adaptation was placed on hold. Jackson and Blomkamp discussed pursuing alternative projects and eventually chose to produce and direct, respectively, District 9. Blomkamp had previously directed commercials and short films, but District 9 was his first feature film
. The director co-wrote the script with Terri Tatchell and chose to film in South Africa, where he was born. In District 9, Tatchell and Blomkamp returned to the world explored in his short film "Alive in Joburg
", choosing characters, moments and concepts that they found interesting, and fleshing out these elements for the feature film.
Blomkamp, having grown up in Johannesburg and being a huge fan of science fiction, wanted to blend together these two elements and present them to the audience as a familiar but alien experience. He tested this premise in his short film "Alive in Joburg" and used elements of this film as the groundwork for the feature-lentgth adaptation that became "District 9." Some of the elements he transferred from his short film the documentary style filmmaking, staged interviews, alien designs, alien technology/mecha suits, and the parallels to racial conflict and segregation in South Africa. Influences that shaped Blomkamp's vision for the film included "V," David Cronenberg's remake of "The Fly," "Robocop," and the movie "Alien Nation."
District 9 and Alive in Joburg both are films that were directed by Neill Blomkamp. The feature film, District 9, was adapted from the short film, Alive in Joburg. The relationship between these two films is very alike in that both are about aliens populating a certain area in South Africa and the growing tension between the humans and the extra-terrestrial life forms. The aliens featured in these films are much the same in that they are quite humanoid except that they have tentacles in place of the human mouth. Production-wise, they are also similar in that they used the same documentary-style imagery. Both integrate interviews in their films to capture what the humans think of the alien population. The major difference between these two films is that while Alive in Joburg portrays the aliens living with the humans, District 9 has their aliens segregated and confined to a refugee camp.
QED International fully financed the production of the independent film, underwriting the negative cost
prior to American Film Market
(AFM) 2007. At AFM 2007, QED entered into a distribution deal with Sony Pictures under TriStar Pictures
for North America and other English-language territories, Korea, Italy, Russia and Portugal.
during a time of violent unrest in Alexandra, Gauteng
and other South African townships involving clashes between native South Africans and Africans born in other countries. The location that portrays District 9 in itself was in fact a real impoverished neighborhood from which people were being forcibly relocated to government-subsidised housing.
Filming for District 9 took place during the winter in Johannesburg, South Africa. According to director Neill Blomkamp, during the winter season, Johannesburg “actually looks like Chernobyl”, a “nuclear apocalyptic wasteland”. Blomkamp wanted to capture the deserted, bleak atmosphere and environment so he and the crew had to film during the months of June through July. The film took a total of 60 days of shooting. Filming in December was another issue in that there was much more rain. Due to the rain, there was a lot of greenery to work with, which was not what Blomkamp desired. In fact, Blomkamp had to cut some of the vegetation in the scenery to portray the setting as desolate and dark.
Blomkamp said no one film influenced District 9, but cited the 1980s "hardcore sci-fi/action" films such as Alien
, Aliens
, The Terminator
, Terminator 2: Judgment Day
, Predator
and RoboCop
as subconscious influences. The director said, "I don't know whether the film has that feeling or not for the audience, but I wanted it to have that harsh 1980s kind of vibe — I didn't want it to feel glossy and slick."
Because of the amount of hand-held shooting
required for the film, the producers and crew decided to shoot using the digital Red One camera. Cinematographer Trent Opaloch used nine digital Red Ones owned by Peter Jackson for primary filming. "District 9 was shot on RED One cameras using build 15, Cooke S4 primes and Angenieux zooms. The documentary style and CCTV cam footage was shot on the Sony EX1/EX3 XDCAM-HD." "The District 9 post production team were warned that the most RED footage they could handle a day was about an hour and a half. When that got to five hours a day reinforcements were called and 120 Terabytes of data was filled."
, and the design was executed by Image Engine
. Blomkamp wanted the aliens to maintain both humanistic and barbaric features in the design of the creatures. According to Terri Tatchell, the director’s writing partner, “They are not appealing, they are not cute, and they don’t tug at our heartstrings. He went for a scary, hard, warrior-looking alien, which is much more of a challenge.” The look of the alien, with its exoskeleton-crustacean hybrid and crab-like shells, was meant to initially evoke a sense of disgust from viewers but as the story progresses, the audience was meant to sympathize with these creatures who had such human-like emotions and characteristics. Blomkamp established criteria for the design of the aliens. He wanted the species to be insect-like but also bipedal. The director wanted the audience to relate to the aliens and said of the restriction on the creature design, "Unfortunately, they had to be human-esque because our psychology doesn't allow us to really empathize with something unless it has a face and an anthropomorphic shape. Like if you see something that's four-legged, you think it's a dog; that's just how we're wired... If you make a film about an alien force, which is the oppressor or aggressor, and you don't want to empathize with them, you can go to town. So creatively that's what I wanted to do but story-wise, I just couldn't." Blomkamp originally sought to have Weta Digital
design the creatures, but the company was busy with effects for Avatar. The director then decided to choose a Vancouver-based effects company because he anticipated to make films there in the future and because British Columbia
offered a tax credit. Blomkamp met with Image Engine and considered them "a bit of a gamble" since the company had not pursued a project as large as a feature film. Aside from the aliens appearing on the operating table in the medical lab, all of them were created using CGI
visual effects.
Weta Digital designed the mothership and the drop ship, while the exo-suit and the little pets were designed by The Embassy Visual Effects
. Zoic Studios
performed overflow 2D work. On-set live special effects were created by MXFX.
. District Six, an inner-city residential area in Cape Town
, was declared a "whites only" area by the government in 1966, with 60,000 people forcibly removed and relocated to Cape Flats
, 25 km (15 mi) away. The film also refers to contemporary evictions and forced removals to new suburban ghettos in post-apartheid South Africa as well as the resistance of its residents. This includes the high profile attempted forced removal of the Joe Slovo informal settlement in Cape Town to temporary relocation areas in Delft
, plus the attempted evictions of Abahlali baseMjondolo
and evictions in the shack settlement, Chiawelo, where the film was actually shot. Blikkiesdorp
, a temporary relocation area in Cape Town, has also been compared with the District 9 camp earning a front page spread in the Daily Voice.
The film makes a statement about inhumanity in the irony of Wikus becoming more humane as he becomes less human. Throughout the movie, he becomes more aware of the aliens' plight, eventually helping them escape the planet, even turning on his own species to do so. Chris Mikesell from the Hawaii newspaper, Ka Leo, notes that inhumanity is a deep-rooted theme throughout. He writes: "Substitute 'black,' 'Asian,' 'Mexican,' 'illegal,' 'Jew,' or any number of different labels for the word 'prawn' in this film and you will hear the hidden truth behind the dialogue". Alien eggs are destroyed before hatching and described as popcorn. He feels that District 9 shows the corruption humans are capable of. M.N.U., the corporation in charge of protecting the aliens, are actually taking away captured aliens and using them as experiments in order to be able to use their weapons.
Themes of racism
and xenophobia
are put forward by the movie in the form of speciesism
applied to the aliens. The use of the word "prawn" to describe the aliens is a reference to the Parktown prawn
, a king cricket species considered a pest in South Africa. Copley has said that the theme is not intended to be the main focus of the work, but rather that it can work at a subconscious level even if it is not noticed.
Duane Dudek from the Journal Sentinel wrote that "The result is an action film about xenophobia, in which all races of humans are united in their dislike and mistrust of an insect-like species".
An underlying theme in District 9 is state reliance on multinational corporations as a government funded enforcement arm. As MNU represents the type of corporation which partners with governments, the negative portrayal of MNU in the film can be seen as a statement about the dangers of governments, particularly in their outsourcing of militaries and bureaucracies to private contractors.
drums and synthesized instruments for the desired effects, with the core African elements of the score conveyed in the vocals and smaller percussion. Both the score and soundtrack feature music and vocals from Kwaito
artists.
s that appear throughout the film. Billboards, banners, posters, and stickers were thus designed with the theme in mind, and the material was spread across public places such as bus stops in various cities, including "humans only" signs in certain locations and providing toll-free numbers to report "non-human" activity. Promotional material was also presented at the 2008 San Diego Comic-Con, advertising the website D-9.com, which had an application presented by the fictional Multi-National United (MNU). The website had a local alert system for Johannesburg (the film's setting), news feeds, behavior recommendations, and rules and regulations. Other viral websites for the film were also launched, including an MNU website with a countdown timer for the film's release, an anti-MNU blog run by fictional alien character Christopher Johnson, and an MNU-sponsored educational website. An online game for District 9 has also been made where players can choose to be a human or an alien. Humans are MNU agents on patrol trying to arrest or kill aliens. Aliens try to avoid capture from MNU agents whilst searching for alien canisters.
It opened in 3,048 theaters in Canada and the United States on August 14, 2009, and the film ranked first at the weekend box office with an opening gross of $37,354,308. Among comparable science fiction films in the past, its opening attendance was slightly less than the 2008 film Cloverfield
and the 1997 film Starship Troopers
. The audience demographic for District 9 was 64 percent male and 57 percent people 25 years or older. The film stood out as a summer film that generated strong business despite little-known casting. Its opening success was attributed to the studio's unusual marketing campaign. In the film's second weekend, it dropped 49% in revenue while competing against the opening film Inglourious Basterds for the male audience, as Sony Pictures attributed the "good hold" to District 9s strong playability.
The film enjoyed similar success in the UK with an opening gross of £2,288,378 showing at 447 cinemas.
reporting that 91% of critics gave the film a positive review, based on a sample of 244, with an average
score of 7.8 out of 10. The website wrote of the consensus, "Technically brilliant and emotionally wrenching, District 9 has action, imagination, and all the elements of a thoroughly entertaining science-fiction classic." At Metacritic
, which assigns a normalized
rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, the film has received a score of 81 based on 36 reviews, indicating "Universal Acclaim". On Spill.com
it received their highest rating of 'Better Than Sex!'. IGN listed District 9 as 24 on a list of the 25 Great Sci-Fi films ever.
Sara Vilkomerson of The New York Observer wrote, "District 9 is the most exciting science fiction movie to come along in ages; definitely the most thrilling film of the summer; and quite possibly the best film I've seen all year." Christy Lemire
from the Associated Press
was impressed by the plot and thematic content, claiming that "District 9 has the aesthetic trappings of science fiction but it's really more of a character drama, an examination of how a man responds when he's forced to confront his identity during extraordinary circumstances." Entertainment Weekly
s Lisa Schwarzbaum described it as "... madly original, cheekily political, [and] altogether exciting ..."
Roger Ebert
praised the film for "giving us aliens to remind us not everyone who comes in a spaceship need be angelic, octopod or stainless steel," but complains that "... the third act is disappointing, involving standard shoot-out action. No attempt is made to resolve the situation, and if that's a happy ending, I've seen happier. Despite its creativity, the film remains space opera
and avoids the higher realms of science-fiction." New York Press
critic Armond White
lambasted the film for its outlandish premise and perceived racial insensitivity toward its apartheid allegories. He asserts that "Blomkamp and Jackson want it every which way: The actuality-video threat of The Blair Witch Project
, unstoppable violence like ID4
plus Spielberg's otherworldly benevolence: factitiousness, killing and cosmic agape. This is how cinema gets turned into trash." The review was initially defended by Roger Ebert, but soon after Ebert referred to White as a troll
though White countered that Ebert was in fact the troll, claiming Ebert was pressured by his employers to retract his support. Josh Tyler of Cinema Blend
says the film is unique in interpretation and execution, but considers it to be a knockoff of the 1988 film Alien Nation
.
Many Nigerians, both in the country and abroad, were deeply offended by the film. Nigeria's Information Minister Dora Akunyili
asked movie theatres around the country to either ban the film or edit out specific references to the country, because of the film's negative depiction of the Nigerian characters as criminals and cannibals. Letters of complaint were sent to the producer and distributor of the film demanding an apology. She also said the gang leader Obesandjo is almost identical in spelling and pronunciation to the surname of former president Olusegun Obasanjo. The film was later banned in Nigeria; the Nigerian Film and Video Censors Board was asked to prevent cinemas from showing the film and also to confiscate it.
Many Nigerians also accused District 9 of being xenophobic. Online petitions and Facebook groups called "District 9 Hates Nigerians" were started. Hakeem Kae-Kazim
, a British born Nigerian actor also criticized the portrayal of Nigerians in the film, telling the Beeld newspaper Africa is a beautiful place and the problems it does have can not be shown by such a small group of people.
. The film received four Academy Awards
nominations, seven British Academy Film Awards
nominations, five Broadcast Film Critics Association
nominations, and one Golden Globe nomination. It is the fourth film ever nominated for Best Picture at the Academy Awards
for TriStar Pictures
behind As Good as It Gets
, Jerry Maguire
and Bugsy
. It won the 2009 Bradbury Award
from the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America
.
and Region 1 Code
widescreen
edition of District 9 as well as the 2-disc special edition version on DVD
was released on December 22, 2009. The DVD and Blu-ray Disc includes the documentary "The Alien Agenda: A Filmmaker's Log" and the special features "Metamorphosis: The Transformation of Wikus", "Innovation: Acting and Improvisation", "Conception and Design: Creating the World of District 9", and "Alien Generation: Visual Effects". The demo for the video game God of War III
featured in the 2009 Electronic Entertainment Expo
is also included with the Blu-ray release of District 9 playable on the Sony PlayStation 3
.
breakfast radio show, he alluded to it, saying "There probably will be." Nevertheless, he revealed that his next project is unrelated to the District 9 universe.
In an interview with Rotten Tomatoes
, Blomkamp stated that he was "totally" hoping for a follow-up: "I haven't thought of a story yet but if people want to see another one, I'd love to do it."
Blomkamp has posed the possibility of the next movie in the series being a prequel
.
In an interview with Empire magazine posted on April 28, 2010, Sharlto Copley suggested that a follow-up, while very likely, would be about two years away, given his and Neill Blomkamp's current commitments.
South Africa
The Republic of South Africa is a country in southern Africa. Located at the southern tip of Africa, it is divided into nine provinces, with of coastline on the Atlantic and Indian oceans...
n science fiction
Science fiction film
Science fiction film is a film genre that uses science fiction: speculative, science-based depictions of phenomena that are not necessarily accepted by mainstream science, such as extraterrestrial life forms, alien worlds, extrasensory perception, and time travel, often along with futuristic...
thriller film directed by Neill Blomkamp
Neill Blomkamp
Neill Blomkamp is an Afrikaner-Canadian film and advertisement writer and director. Blomkamp employs a documentary-style, hand-held, cinéma vérité technique, blending naturalistic and photo-realistic computer-generated effects. He is best known as the co-writer and director of critically acclaimed...
. It was written by Blomkamp and Terri Tatchell
Terri Tatchell
Terri Tatchell is a Canadian screenwriter, best known for the co-writing the screenplay of District 9 and was nominated for the Best Adapted Screenplay at the 82nd Academy Awards.-Biography:...
, and produced by Peter Jackson
Peter Jackson
Sir Peter Robert Jackson, KNZM is a New Zealand film director, producer, actor, and screenwriter, known for his The Lord of the Rings film trilogy , adapted from the novel by J. R. R...
and Carolynne Cunningham. The film stars Sharlto Copley
Sharlto Copley
Sharlto Copley is a South African producer, actor, and director who has produced and co-directed short films which have appeared at the Cannes Film Festival, as well as commercials and music videos...
, Jason Cope
Jason Cope
Jason Cope is a South African actor best known for his work in Neill Blomkamp's District 9. In the film Cope plays a variety of different characters including the alien Christopher Johnson and the character Grey Bradnam, one of the narrators of the film...
, and David James
David James (South African actor)
David James is a South African film, theater, and television actor known mainly for playing the villainous Koobus Venter in the 2009 Oscar-nominated science fiction film District 9.- Personal life :...
. The film won the 2010 Saturn Award
Saturn Award
The Saturn Award is an award presented annually by the Academy of Science Fiction, Fantasy & Horror Films to honor the top works in science fiction, fantasy, and horror in film, television, and home video. The Saturn Awards were devised by Dr. Donald A. Reed in 1972, who felt that films within...
for Best International Film presented by the Academy of Science Fiction, Fantasy & Horror Films, and was nominated for four Academy Awards
82nd Academy Awards
The 82nd Academy Awards ceremony, presented by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences , honored the best films of 2009 and took place March 7, 2010, at the Kodak Theatre in Hollywood, Los Angeles beginning at 5:30 p.m. PST / 8:30 p.m. EST. The ceremony was scheduled well after...
in 2010, including Best Picture
Academy Award for Best Picture
The Academy Award for Best Picture is one of the Academy Awards of Merit presented annually by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to artists working in the motion picture industry. The Best Picture category is the only category in which every member of the Academy is eligible not only...
, Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Visual Effects, and Best Editing.
The story, adapted from Alive in Joburg
Alive in Joburg
"Alive in Joburg" is a 2005 science fiction short film directed by Neill Blomkamp, produced by Simon Hansen and Sharlto Copley in Canada, and released by Spy Films. It runs approximately six minutes long and was filmed in Johannesburg, South Africa with soundtrack featuring composer sound designer...
, a 2005 short film directed by Blomkamp and produced by Sharlto Copley and Simon Hansen
Simon Hansen
Simon Hansen is a South African born film maker who is considered by some to be leading South Africa's revolution in their local film industry. Hansen has been working in the Film and entertainment industry since 1992 and is a world class innovator...
, pivots on the themes of xenophobia
Xenophobia
Xenophobia is defined as "an unreasonable fear of foreigners or strangers or of that which is foreign or strange". It comes from the Greek words ξένος , meaning "stranger," "foreigner" and φόβος , meaning "fear."...
and social segregation
Social apartheid
Social apartheid refers to de facto segregation on the basis of class or economic status, in which an underclass is forced to exist separated from the rest of the population...
. The title and premise of District 9 were inspired by events that took place in District Six, Cape Town
District Six, Cape Town
District Six is the name of a former inner-city residential area in Cape Town, South Africa. It is best known for the forced removal of over 60,000 of its inhabitants during the 1970s by the apartheid regime....
during the apartheid era. The film was produced for $30 million and shot on location in Chiawelo, Soweto
Soweto
Soweto is a lower-class-populated urban area of the city of Johannesburg in Gauteng, South Africa, bordering the city's mining belt in the south. Its name is an English syllabic abbreviation for South Western Townships...
, presenting fictional interviews, news footage, and video from surveillance cameras in a part-mock documentary
Mockumentary
A mockumentary , is a type of film or television show in which fictitious events are presented in documentary format. These productions are often used to analyze or comment on current events and issues by using a fictitious setting, or to parody the documentary form itself...
style format. A viral marketing
Viral marketing
Viral marketing, viral advertising, or marketing buzz are buzzwords referring to marketing techniques that use pre-existing social networks to produce increases in brand awareness or to achieve other marketing objectives through self-replicating viral processes, analogous to the spread of viruses...
campaign began in 2008, at the San Diego Comic-Con, while the theatrical trailer appeared in July 2009. Released by TriStar Pictures
TriStar Pictures
TriStar Pictures, Inc. is an American film production/distribution studio and subsidiary of Columbia Pictures, itself a subdivision of the Columbia TriStar Motion Picture Group, which is owned by Sony Pictures...
, the film opened to critical acclaim on August 14, 2009, in North America and earned $37 million in its opening weekend. Many saw the film as a sleeper hit
Sleeper hit
A sleeper hit, a.k.a. surprise hit , refers to a film, book, single, album, TV show, or video game that gains unexpected success or recognition...
for its relatively unknown cast and modest-budget production, while achieving success and popularity during its theatrical run.
Plot
In March 1982, a large alienExtraterrestrial life
Extraterrestrial life is defined as life that does not originate from Earth...
spacecraft comes to Earth and hovers motionless above Johannesburg
Johannesburg
Johannesburg also known as Jozi, Jo'burg or Egoli, is the largest city in South Africa, by population. Johannesburg is the provincial capital of Gauteng, the wealthiest province in South Africa, having the largest economy of any metropolitan region in Sub-Saharan Africa...
in South Africa
South Africa
The Republic of South Africa is a country in southern Africa. Located at the southern tip of Africa, it is divided into nine provinces, with of coastline on the Atlantic and Indian oceans...
. After three months of no contact and no signs of activity, a team enters the ship, discovering a large group of sick and malnourished extraterrestrials, who are then given food, shelter, and health-care on Earth. The aliens, derogatorily referred to by some locals as "prawn
Parktown prawn
The Parktown prawn aka Parkmore prawn aka Parkhurst prawn, Libanasidus vittatus, is a monotypic species of king cricket found in Southern Africa. Although a member of the cricket order Orthoptera, it is placed in the family Anostostomatidae, separate from that of the true crickets, Gryllidae...
s", are confined to District 9, a government camp inside Johannesburg. Following their settlement, periodic unrest occurs between aliens and locals.
In the first decade of the 21st century, the South African government hires Multinational United (MNU), a private military company
Private military company
A private military company or provides military and security services. These combatants are commonly known as mercenaries, though modern-day PMCs refer to their staff as security contractors, private military contractors or private security contractors, and refer to themselves as private military...
under the direction of its CEO, Dirk Michaels (William Allen Young
William Allen Young
William Allen Young is an American actor best known for playing a role of Frank Mitchell on UPN's Moesha in 1996 and directing a few episodes of the show, and made a guest appearance on UPN's The Parkers as Frank Mitchell...
), to relocate the aliens to the new District 10. In August 2010, Wikus van de Merwe (Sharlto Copley
Sharlto Copley
Sharlto Copley is a South African producer, actor, and director who has produced and co-directed short films which have appeared at the Cannes Film Festival, as well as commercials and music videos...
), an Afrikaner
Afrikaner
Afrikaners are an ethnic group in Southern Africa descended from almost equal numbers of Dutch, French and German settlers whose native tongue is Afrikaans: a Germanic language which derives primarily from 17th century Dutch, and a variety of other languages.-Related ethno-linguistic groups:The...
bureaucrat
Bureaucrat
A bureaucrat is a member of a bureaucracy and can comprise the administration of any organization of any size, though the term usually connotes someone within an institution of a government or corporation...
, is appointed by Piet Smit (Dirk Minnaar), an MNU executive and his father-in-law, to lead the relocation with the serving of illegal eviction notices.
Meanwhile, three aliens (Christopher Johnson (Jason Cope
Jason Cope
Jason Cope is a South African actor best known for his work in Neill Blomkamp's District 9. In the film Cope plays a variety of different characters including the alien Christopher Johnson and the character Grey Bradnam, one of the narrators of the film...
), his son, and a friend), search for alien technology from which they distill a mysterious fluid, storing it in a small canister. Later, while raiding the shack of Christopher's friend, Wikus discovers and seizes the container, which sprays an unidentified substance onto his face. Christopher's friend is subsequently killed by Koobus Venter (David James
David James (South African actor)
David James is a South African film, theater, and television actor known mainly for playing the villainous Koobus Venter in the 2009 Oscar-nominated science fiction film District 9.- Personal life :...
), a xenophobic soldier leading the operation.
The mysterious fluid makes Wikus ill and begins to turn his DNA and body into those of a "prawn". MNU finds out and they force Wikus to test various alien weapons which only function when used by an alien; he succeeds at using them. The MNU scientists then decide to vivisect Wikus' organs because they are deemed to be worth billions for biotech research, but he overpowers his captors and escapes. Smit lies to the press, saying that Wikus is infected with an alien STD
Sexually transmitted disease
Sexually transmitted disease , also known as a sexually transmitted infection or venereal disease , is an illness that has a significant probability of transmission between humans by means of human sexual behavior, including vaginal intercourse, oral sex, and anal sex...
and is highly contagious. He also sends Venter and his men to capture him.
Wikus finds refuge in District 9 and seeks help from Christopher, who reveals that the canister would allow him to reactivate the dormant mothership and reverse Wikus' mutation. He then reveals the lost command-module hidden under his shack, and agrees to help Wikus if he retrieves the canister from MNU. Wikus agrees and steals weapons from Nigerian arms-dealer Obesandjo and his gang.
Wikus and Christopher break into the MNU offices and successfully retrieve the canister; they flee back to District 9, with MNU forces in pursuit. Outraged by illegal experiments he saw at the MNU headquarters, Christopher tells Wikus that he will need to seek help for the other aliens before curing him. Unfortunately, the trip to the alien planet and back will take three years. Enraged, Wikus attacks Christopher, then hijacks the command module. Soon after takeoff, the craft is shot down and crashes. Venter and his men arrest Wikus and Christopher, but Obesandjo's gang ambushes the MNU convoy, kills the guards, and after an intense firefight, Wikus is taken to Obesandjo, who believes that by eating Wikus' mutated alien hand he will gain the ability to use alien weaponry. Obesandjo's base is then surrounded and besieged by MNU and a firefight ensues.
In the downed command module, Christopher's son activates the mothership and an alien mechanized battle suit which, upon detecting a threat to Wikus, kills Obesandjo and his men before they can butcher Wikus. Wikus takes control of the battle suit and rescues Christopher, shielding Christopher as they run to the command module and killing many MNU men firing upon them. Wikus then aids Christopher's escape by staying behind and holding off the MNU troops in his ailing mechanized battle suit. Wikus kills all the troops except Venter, who cripples his suit and forces it to eject him. He is cornered by Venter, who tells him he plans to execute him to prevent further repercussions. However, a group of aliens surround Venter and tear him to pieces before eating what remains. Christopher promises to return in three years and leaves in the mothership with his son as Johannesburg's residents celebrate its departure.
A series of interviews and news broadcasts are shown, with people theorizing about Wikus' whereabouts. MNU's illegal experiments on the aliens are uncovered and exposed by Fundiswa Mhlanga, Wikus' former trainee, who is incarcerated and awaiting trial on a false charge of corporate espionage. District 9 is completely demolished, with all the aliens having been moved to the new larger District 10 240 km (149.1 mi) outside the city. Wikus' wife, Tania (Vanessa Haywood), reveals the finding of a metal flower on her doorstep, which gives her hope that her husband is still alive. Interviews are given implying whether or not Christopher's return will either mean reconciling Earth and the Prawns, or war declaration against humans. The film ends with a shot of a fully transformed Wikus crafting a similar flower in a scrapyard.
Cast
- Sharlto CopleySharlto CopleySharlto Copley is a South African producer, actor, and director who has produced and co-directed short films which have appeared at the Cannes Film Festival, as well as commercials and music videos...
as Wikus van de Merwe, an ostensibly mild-mannered manager at the MNU Department of Alien Affairs, whose blasé, even callous attitude to the aliens changes as he comes to see things from their point of view. This was the first time acting professionally in a feature filmFeature filmIn the film industry, a feature film is a film production made for initial distribution in theaters and being the main attraction of the screening, rather than a short film screened before it; a full length movie...
for Copley, a friend of director Blomkamp. - Jason CopeJason CopeJason Cope is a South African actor best known for his work in Neill Blomkamp's District 9. In the film Cope plays a variety of different characters including the alien Christopher Johnson and the character Grey Bradnam, one of the narrators of the film...
as Christopher Johnson, an alien. Cope also performed the role of Grey Bradnam, the UKNR Chief Correspondent and all the speaking aliens. - David JamesDavid James (South African actor)David James is a South African film, theater, and television actor known mainly for playing the villainous Koobus Venter in the 2009 Oscar-nominated science fiction film District 9.- Personal life :...
as Colonel Koobus Venter, a PMCPrivate military companyA private military company or provides military and security services. These combatants are commonly known as mercenaries, though modern-day PMCs refer to their staff as security contractors, private military contractors or private security contractors, and refer to themselves as private military...
mercenary-soldier sent to capture Wikus. He is shown as sadistic and violent, taking great pleasure in killing the aliens and treating with violence anyone who opposes him. - Eugene Khumbanyiwa as Obesandjo, a paralyzed psychopathic Nigerian warlord who believes that eating alien bodyparts will give him the ability to operate their weapons.
- Louis Minnaar as Piet Smit, a director at MNU, and Wikus' father-in-law. He is the one who creates the cover-up that turns Wikus into a fugitive, and tries to turn his daughter against Wikus by saying he had committed adultery by having sexual intercourse with the aliens.
- Mandla Gaduka as Fundiswa Mhlanga, Wikus' assistant and trainee during the eviction. At the end of the film he is shown to be prosecuted for uncovering MNU's illegal activities.
- Vanessa Haywood as Tania Smit van de Merwe, Wikus' wife.
- Robert Hobbs as Ross Pienaar.
- Kenneth Nkosi as Thomas, an MNU security guard.
- Nathalie BolttNathalie BolttNathalie Boltt is a South African actress, known in that country for her role as Joey Ortlepp in the SABC 3 soap opera Isidingo from 2001 to 2004....
as Sarah Livingstone, a sociologist at Kempton ParkKempton Park, GautengKempton Park is a city on the East Rand in the Gauteng province, South Africa. Formerly an independent municipality in the Transvaal, Kempton Park no longer has its own municipal government, and has been part of the Ekurhuleni Metropolitan Municipality since 2000...
University. - Sylvaine StrikeSylvaine StrikeSylvaine Strike is a South African actress, writer and theater director. She was born in Pretoria and studied in Cape Town, where she graduated with a Performer's Diploma in Speech and Drama in 1993...
as Katrina McKenzie, a doctor from the Department of Social Assistance. - John Sumner as Les Feldman, a MIL engineer.
- Nick Blake as Francois Moraneu, a member of the CIV Engineer Team.
- Jed BrophyJed BrophyJed Brophy is a film actor from New Zealand. He has appeared in several of Peter Jackson's films, including Braindead, Heavenly Creatures, The Lord of the Rings film trilogy, King Kong, and will also appear as the dwarf Nori in The Hobbit films.-Filmography:-External links:...
as James Hope, the ACU chief of police. - Vittorio LeonardiVittorio LeonardiVittorio Leonardi is a South African stand-up comedian and actor. As a comedian, he has performed as a member of Joe Parker's Comedy Express, as well as performing improvisational theatre with Joe Parker's Improv Express, and has appeared on stages in Witbank, Pretoria, Johannesburg, Vereeniging,...
as Michael Bloemstein, from the MNU Dept. of Alien Civil Affairs. - Johan van Schoor as Nicolaas van de Merwe, Wikus' father.
- Marian Hooman as Sandra van de Merwe, Wikus' mother.
- Stella Steenkamp as Phyllis Sinderson, a co-worker of Wikus'.
- Tim Gordon as Clive Henderson, an entomologist at WLG University.
- Jonathan Taylor as the Doctor.
- Nick Boraine as Lieutenant Weldon, Colonel Venter's right-hand man.
Development
Producer Peter JacksonPeter Jackson
Sir Peter Robert Jackson, KNZM is a New Zealand film director, producer, actor, and screenwriter, known for his The Lord of the Rings film trilogy , adapted from the novel by J. R. R...
planned to produce a film adaptation based on the Halo
Halo (series)
Halo is a multi-million dollar science fiction video game franchise created by Bungie and now managed by 343 Industries and owned by Microsoft Studios. The series centers on an interstellar war between humanity and a theocratic alliance of aliens known as the Covenant...
video game franchise with first-time director Neill Blomkamp
Neill Blomkamp
Neill Blomkamp is an Afrikaner-Canadian film and advertisement writer and director. Blomkamp employs a documentary-style, hand-held, cinéma vérité technique, blending naturalistic and photo-realistic computer-generated effects. He is best known as the co-writer and director of critically acclaimed...
. Due to a lack of financing, the Halo adaptation was placed on hold. Jackson and Blomkamp discussed pursuing alternative projects and eventually chose to produce and direct, respectively, District 9. Blomkamp had previously directed commercials and short films, but District 9 was his first feature film
Feature film
In the film industry, a feature film is a film production made for initial distribution in theaters and being the main attraction of the screening, rather than a short film screened before it; a full length movie...
. The director co-wrote the script with Terri Tatchell and chose to film in South Africa, where he was born. In District 9, Tatchell and Blomkamp returned to the world explored in his short film "Alive in Joburg
Alive in Joburg
"Alive in Joburg" is a 2005 science fiction short film directed by Neill Blomkamp, produced by Simon Hansen and Sharlto Copley in Canada, and released by Spy Films. It runs approximately six minutes long and was filmed in Johannesburg, South Africa with soundtrack featuring composer sound designer...
", choosing characters, moments and concepts that they found interesting, and fleshing out these elements for the feature film.
Blomkamp, having grown up in Johannesburg and being a huge fan of science fiction, wanted to blend together these two elements and present them to the audience as a familiar but alien experience. He tested this premise in his short film "Alive in Joburg" and used elements of this film as the groundwork for the feature-lentgth adaptation that became "District 9." Some of the elements he transferred from his short film the documentary style filmmaking, staged interviews, alien designs, alien technology/mecha suits, and the parallels to racial conflict and segregation in South Africa. Influences that shaped Blomkamp's vision for the film included "V," David Cronenberg's remake of "The Fly," "Robocop," and the movie "Alien Nation."
District 9 and Alive in Joburg both are films that were directed by Neill Blomkamp. The feature film, District 9, was adapted from the short film, Alive in Joburg. The relationship between these two films is very alike in that both are about aliens populating a certain area in South Africa and the growing tension between the humans and the extra-terrestrial life forms. The aliens featured in these films are much the same in that they are quite humanoid except that they have tentacles in place of the human mouth. Production-wise, they are also similar in that they used the same documentary-style imagery. Both integrate interviews in their films to capture what the humans think of the alien population. The major difference between these two films is that while Alive in Joburg portrays the aliens living with the humans, District 9 has their aliens segregated and confined to a refugee camp.
QED International fully financed the production of the independent film, underwriting the negative cost
Negative cost
Negative cost is the cost of actually producing and shooting a film. It does not include such costs as distribution and promotion.Low-budget movies, for example The Blair Witch Project, can have promotional expenses that are much larger than the negative cost.The term comes from the costs up to the...
prior to American Film Market
American Film Market
The American Film Market is a film industry event held each year at the beginning of November in Santa Monica, California. About 8,000 people attend the eight day event to network and to sell and acquire films...
(AFM) 2007. At AFM 2007, QED entered into a distribution deal with Sony Pictures under TriStar Pictures
TriStar Pictures
TriStar Pictures, Inc. is an American film production/distribution studio and subsidiary of Columbia Pictures, itself a subdivision of the Columbia TriStar Motion Picture Group, which is owned by Sony Pictures...
for North America and other English-language territories, Korea, Italy, Russia and Portugal.
Filming
The film was shot on location in Chiawelo, SowetoSoweto
Soweto is a lower-class-populated urban area of the city of Johannesburg in Gauteng, South Africa, bordering the city's mining belt in the south. Its name is an English syllabic abbreviation for South Western Townships...
during a time of violent unrest in Alexandra, Gauteng
Alexandra, Gauteng
Alexandra or Alex for short, nicknamed Gomora is a township located in Gauteng province, South Africa. It is part of Johannesburg, close to the wealthy suburb of Sandton and is bounded by Wynberg on the west, Marlboro and Kelvin on the north, Kew, Lombardy West and Lombardy East on the south...
and other South African townships involving clashes between native South Africans and Africans born in other countries. The location that portrays District 9 in itself was in fact a real impoverished neighborhood from which people were being forcibly relocated to government-subsidised housing.
Filming for District 9 took place during the winter in Johannesburg, South Africa. According to director Neill Blomkamp, during the winter season, Johannesburg “actually looks like Chernobyl”, a “nuclear apocalyptic wasteland”. Blomkamp wanted to capture the deserted, bleak atmosphere and environment so he and the crew had to film during the months of June through July. The film took a total of 60 days of shooting. Filming in December was another issue in that there was much more rain. Due to the rain, there was a lot of greenery to work with, which was not what Blomkamp desired. In fact, Blomkamp had to cut some of the vegetation in the scenery to portray the setting as desolate and dark.
Blomkamp said no one film influenced District 9, but cited the 1980s "hardcore sci-fi/action" films such as Alien
Alien (film)
Alien is a 1979 science fiction horror film directed by Ridley Scott and starring Tom Skerritt, Sigourney Weaver, Veronica Cartwright, Harry Dean Stanton, John Hurt, Ian Holm and Yaphet Kotto. The film's title refers to its primary antagonist: a highly aggressive extraterrestrial creature which...
, Aliens
Aliens (film)
Aliens is a 1986 science fiction action film directed by James Cameron and starring Sigourney Weaver, Carrie Henn, Michael Biehn, Lance Henriksen, William Hope, and Bill Paxton...
, The Terminator
The Terminator
The Terminator is a 1984 science fiction action film directed by James Cameron, co-written by Cameron and William Wisher Jr., and starring Arnold Schwarzenegger, Michael Biehn, and Linda Hamilton. The film was produced by Hemdale Film Corporation and distributed by Orion Pictures, and filmed in Los...
, Terminator 2: Judgment Day
Terminator 2: Judgment Day
Terminator 2: Judgment Day is a 1991 science fiction action film directed by James Cameron and written by Cameron and William Wisher Jr.. It stars Arnold Schwarzenegger, Linda Hamilton, Robert Patrick, and Edward Furlong...
, Predator
Predator (film)
Predator is a 1987 American science fiction action film directed by John McTiernan, starring Arnold Schwarzenegger, Carl Weathers, Jesse Ventura, and Kevin Peter Hall. It was distributed by 20th Century Fox....
and RoboCop
RoboCop
RoboCop is a 1987 American science fiction-action film directed by Paul Verhoeven. Set in a crime-ridden Detroit, Michigan in the near future, RoboCop centers on a police officer who is brutally murdered and subsequently re-created as a super-human cyborg known as "RoboCop"...
as subconscious influences. The director said, "I don't know whether the film has that feeling or not for the audience, but I wanted it to have that harsh 1980s kind of vibe — I didn't want it to feel glossy and slick."
Because of the amount of hand-held shooting
Hand-held camera
Hand-held camera or hand-held shooting is a filmmaking and video production technique in which a camera is held in the camera operator's hands as opposed to being mounted on a tripod or other base. Hand-held cameras are used because they are conveniently sized for travel and because they allow...
required for the film, the producers and crew decided to shoot using the digital Red One camera. Cinematographer Trent Opaloch used nine digital Red Ones owned by Peter Jackson for primary filming. "District 9 was shot on RED One cameras using build 15, Cooke S4 primes and Angenieux zooms. The documentary style and CCTV cam footage was shot on the Sony EX1/EX3 XDCAM-HD." "The District 9 post production team were warned that the most RED footage they could handle a day was about an hour and a half. When that got to five hours a day reinforcements were called and 120 Terabytes of data was filled."
Visual effects
Even as a young child living in South Africa, Blomkamp was captivated by artwork and visual effects. “I knew I wanted to be in movies…So I thought I wanted to be in special effects, like model-making and prosthetic effects." The combination of knowing he would find a career in the visual effects area and the advancement of technology allowing better computer graphics capabilities lead him to work at a Canadian post-production company as a visual effects artist. The aliens in District 9 were designed by Weta WorkshopWeta Workshop
Weta Workshop is a special effects and prop company based in Miramar, New Zealand, producing effects for television and film.Founded in 1987 by Richard Taylor and Tania Rodger as RT Effects, Weta Workshop has produced creatures and makeup effects for the TV series Hercules: The Legendary Journeys...
, and the design was executed by Image Engine
Image Engine
Image Engine is a visual effects company based in Vancouver, British Columbia and formed in 1995. In 2010, it was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Visual Effects.-2009:*The Twilight Saga: Eclipse*The Losers*District 9*New in Town-2008:...
. Blomkamp wanted the aliens to maintain both humanistic and barbaric features in the design of the creatures. According to Terri Tatchell, the director’s writing partner, “They are not appealing, they are not cute, and they don’t tug at our heartstrings. He went for a scary, hard, warrior-looking alien, which is much more of a challenge.” The look of the alien, with its exoskeleton-crustacean hybrid and crab-like shells, was meant to initially evoke a sense of disgust from viewers but as the story progresses, the audience was meant to sympathize with these creatures who had such human-like emotions and characteristics. Blomkamp established criteria for the design of the aliens. He wanted the species to be insect-like but also bipedal. The director wanted the audience to relate to the aliens and said of the restriction on the creature design, "Unfortunately, they had to be human-esque because our psychology doesn't allow us to really empathize with something unless it has a face and an anthropomorphic shape. Like if you see something that's four-legged, you think it's a dog; that's just how we're wired... If you make a film about an alien force, which is the oppressor or aggressor, and you don't want to empathize with them, you can go to town. So creatively that's what I wanted to do but story-wise, I just couldn't." Blomkamp originally sought to have Weta Digital
Weta Digital
Weta Digital is a digital visual effects company based in Wellington, New Zealand. It was founded by Peter Jackson, Richard Taylor, and Jamie Selkirk in 1993 to produce the digital special effects for Heavenly Creatures. In 2007 Weta Digital’s Senior Visual Effects Supervisor, Joe Letteri, was...
design the creatures, but the company was busy with effects for Avatar. The director then decided to choose a Vancouver-based effects company because he anticipated to make films there in the future and because British Columbia
British Columbia
British Columbia is the westernmost of Canada's provinces and is known for its natural beauty, as reflected in its Latin motto, Splendor sine occasu . Its name was chosen by Queen Victoria in 1858...
offered a tax credit. Blomkamp met with Image Engine and considered them "a bit of a gamble" since the company had not pursued a project as large as a feature film. Aside from the aliens appearing on the operating table in the medical lab, all of them were created using CGI
Computer-generated imagery
Computer-generated imagery is the application of the field of computer graphics or, more specifically, 3D computer graphics to special effects in art, video games, films, television programs, commercials, simulators and simulation generally, and printed media...
visual effects.
Weta Digital designed the mothership and the drop ship, while the exo-suit and the little pets were designed by The Embassy Visual Effects
The Embassy Visual Effects
The Embassy is a visual effects studio located in Vancouver, Canada. The Embassy is known for its photo-realistic visual effects work on commercials and more recently, features....
. Zoic Studios
Zoic Studios
Zoic Studios is a visual effects company based in Culver City, California. They specialize in visual effects for feature films, episodic television, commercials, video games, advertising design, and interactive online media...
performed overflow 2D work. On-set live special effects were created by MXFX.
Themes
Like Alive in Joburg, the short film on which the feature film is based, the setting of District 9 is inspired by historical events that took place in South Africa during the apartheid era, with the film's title particularly alluding to District SixDistrict Six, Cape Town
District Six is the name of a former inner-city residential area in Cape Town, South Africa. It is best known for the forced removal of over 60,000 of its inhabitants during the 1970s by the apartheid regime....
. District Six, an inner-city residential area in Cape Town
Cape Town
Cape Town is the second-most populous city in South Africa, and the provincial capital and primate city of the Western Cape. As the seat of the National Parliament, it is also the legislative capital of the country. It forms part of the City of Cape Town metropolitan municipality...
, was declared a "whites only" area by the government in 1966, with 60,000 people forcibly removed and relocated to Cape Flats
Cape Flats
The Cape Flats is an expansive, low-lying, flat area situated to the southeast of the central business district of Cape Town. To many people in Cape Town, the area is known simply as 'The Flats'....
, 25 km (15 mi) away. The film also refers to contemporary evictions and forced removals to new suburban ghettos in post-apartheid South Africa as well as the resistance of its residents. This includes the high profile attempted forced removal of the Joe Slovo informal settlement in Cape Town to temporary relocation areas in Delft
Delft, Cape Town
Delft is a township on the outskirts of Cape Town, South Africa. It is situated next to the Cape Town International Airport, Belhar, Blue Downs & Site C, Khayelitsha. It is known for its high crime rate, substandard schools, lack of jobs, and numerous government built housing projects such as the...
, plus the attempted evictions of Abahlali baseMjondolo
Abahlali baseMjondolo
Abahlali baseMjondolo , also known as AbM or the red shirts is a shack-dwellers' movement in South Africa which is well known for its campaigning for public housing. The movement grew out of a road blockade organized from the Kennedy Road shack settlement in the city of Durban in early 2005 and now...
and evictions in the shack settlement, Chiawelo, where the film was actually shot. Blikkiesdorp
Blikkiesdorp
Symphony Way Temporary Relocation Area in Delft, Cape Town, better known by its nickname Blikkiesdorp, is a relocation camp made-up of corrugated iron shacks...
, a temporary relocation area in Cape Town, has also been compared with the District 9 camp earning a front page spread in the Daily Voice.
The film makes a statement about inhumanity in the irony of Wikus becoming more humane as he becomes less human. Throughout the movie, he becomes more aware of the aliens' plight, eventually helping them escape the planet, even turning on his own species to do so. Chris Mikesell from the Hawaii newspaper, Ka Leo, notes that inhumanity is a deep-rooted theme throughout. He writes: "Substitute 'black,' 'Asian,' 'Mexican,' 'illegal,' 'Jew,' or any number of different labels for the word 'prawn' in this film and you will hear the hidden truth behind the dialogue". Alien eggs are destroyed before hatching and described as popcorn. He feels that District 9 shows the corruption humans are capable of. M.N.U., the corporation in charge of protecting the aliens, are actually taking away captured aliens and using them as experiments in order to be able to use their weapons.
Themes of racism
Racism
Racism is the belief that inherent different traits in human racial groups justify discrimination. In the modern English language, the term "racism" is used predominantly as a pejorative epithet. It is applied especially to the practice or advocacy of racial discrimination of a pernicious nature...
and xenophobia
Xenophobia
Xenophobia is defined as "an unreasonable fear of foreigners or strangers or of that which is foreign or strange". It comes from the Greek words ξένος , meaning "stranger," "foreigner" and φόβος , meaning "fear."...
are put forward by the movie in the form of speciesism
Speciesism
Speciesism is the assigning of different values or rights to beings on the basis of their species membership. The term was created by British psychologist Richard D...
applied to the aliens. The use of the word "prawn" to describe the aliens is a reference to the Parktown prawn
Parktown prawn
The Parktown prawn aka Parkmore prawn aka Parkhurst prawn, Libanasidus vittatus, is a monotypic species of king cricket found in Southern Africa. Although a member of the cricket order Orthoptera, it is placed in the family Anostostomatidae, separate from that of the true crickets, Gryllidae...
, a king cricket species considered a pest in South Africa. Copley has said that the theme is not intended to be the main focus of the work, but rather that it can work at a subconscious level even if it is not noticed.
Duane Dudek from the Journal Sentinel wrote that "The result is an action film about xenophobia, in which all races of humans are united in their dislike and mistrust of an insect-like species".
An underlying theme in District 9 is state reliance on multinational corporations as a government funded enforcement arm. As MNU represents the type of corporation which partners with governments, the negative portrayal of MNU in the film can be seen as a statement about the dangers of governments, particularly in their outsourcing of militaries and bureaucracies to private contractors.
Music
The music for District 9 was scored by Canadian composer Clinton Shorter, who spent three weeks preparing for the film. Director Neill Blomkamp wanted a "raw and dark" score, but one that maintained its South African roots. This was a challenge for Shorter, who found much of the South African music he worked with to be optimistic and joyful. Unable to get the African drums to sound dark and heavy, Shorter used a combination of taikoTaiko
means "drum" in Japanese . Outside Japan, the word is often used to refer to any of the various Japanese drums and to the relatively recent art-form of ensemble taiko drumming...
drums and synthesized instruments for the desired effects, with the core African elements of the score conveyed in the vocals and smaller percussion. Both the score and soundtrack feature music and vocals from Kwaito
Kwaito
Kwaito is a music genre that emerged in Johannesburg, South Africa, during the 1990s. It is a variant of house music featuring the use of African sounds and samples. Typically at a slower tempo range than other styles of house music, Kwaito often contains catchy melodic and percussive loop samples,...
artists.
Marketing
Sony Pictures launched a "Humans Only" marketing campaign to promote District 9. Sony's marketing team designed its promotional material to emulate the segregational billboardBillboard
Billboard is a weekly American magazine devoted to the music industry, and is one of the oldest trade magazines in the world. It maintains several internationally recognized music charts that track the most popular songs and albums in various categories on a weekly basis...
s that appear throughout the film. Billboards, banners, posters, and stickers were thus designed with the theme in mind, and the material was spread across public places such as bus stops in various cities, including "humans only" signs in certain locations and providing toll-free numbers to report "non-human" activity. Promotional material was also presented at the 2008 San Diego Comic-Con, advertising the website D-9.com, which had an application presented by the fictional Multi-National United (MNU). The website had a local alert system for Johannesburg (the film's setting), news feeds, behavior recommendations, and rules and regulations. Other viral websites for the film were also launched, including an MNU website with a countdown timer for the film's release, an anti-MNU blog run by fictional alien character Christopher Johnson, and an MNU-sponsored educational website. An online game for District 9 has also been made where players can choose to be a human or an alien. Humans are MNU agents on patrol trying to arrest or kill aliens. Aliens try to avoid capture from MNU agents whilst searching for alien canisters.
Box office
, District 9 had grossed an estimated $210,816,205, of which $115,646,235 was from Canada and the United States making it a huge box office success, with a revenue 7 times its original production budget of only $30 million.It opened in 3,048 theaters in Canada and the United States on August 14, 2009, and the film ranked first at the weekend box office with an opening gross of $37,354,308. Among comparable science fiction films in the past, its opening attendance was slightly less than the 2008 film Cloverfield
Cloverfield
Cloverfield is a 2008 American disaster-monster film directed by Matt Reeves, produced by J. J. Abrams and written by Drew Goddard.The film follows six young New Yorkers attending a going-away party on the night that a gigantic monster attacks the city...
and the 1997 film Starship Troopers
Starship Troopers (film)
Starship Troopers is a 1997 American military science fiction film, written by Edward Neumeier , directed by Paul Verhoeven, loosely adapted from Starship Troopers, a science fiction novel by Robert A. Heinlein. It is the only theatrically released film in the Starship Troopers franchise...
. The audience demographic for District 9 was 64 percent male and 57 percent people 25 years or older. The film stood out as a summer film that generated strong business despite little-known casting. Its opening success was attributed to the studio's unusual marketing campaign. In the film's second weekend, it dropped 49% in revenue while competing against the opening film Inglourious Basterds for the male audience, as Sony Pictures attributed the "good hold" to District 9s strong playability.
The film enjoyed similar success in the UK with an opening gross of £2,288,378 showing at 447 cinemas.
Critics
The film was met with very positive reviews and nearly universal acclaim, with Rotten TomatoesRotten Tomatoes
Rotten Tomatoes is a website devoted to reviews, information, and news of films—widely known as a film review aggregator. Its name derives from the cliché of audiences throwing tomatoes and other vegetables at a poor stage performance...
reporting that 91% of critics gave the film a positive review, based on a sample of 244, with an average
Weighted mean
The weighted mean is similar to an arithmetic mean , where instead of each of the data points contributing equally to the final average, some data points contribute more than others...
score of 7.8 out of 10. The website wrote of the consensus, "Technically brilliant and emotionally wrenching, District 9 has action, imagination, and all the elements of a thoroughly entertaining science-fiction classic." At Metacritic
Metacritic
Metacritic.com is a website that collates reviews of music albums, games, movies, TV shows and DVDs. For each product, a numerical score from each review is obtained and the total is averaged. An excerpt of each review is provided along with a hyperlink to the source. Three colour codes of Green,...
, which assigns a normalized
Standard score
In statistics, a standard score indicates how many standard deviations an observation or datum is above or below the mean. It is a dimensionless quantity derived by subtracting the population mean from an individual raw score and then dividing the difference by the population standard deviation...
rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, the film has received a score of 81 based on 36 reviews, indicating "Universal Acclaim". On Spill.com
Spill.com
Spill.com is an award-winning video game and movie review, discussion, and news website created by cartoonist and animator Korey Coleman. It is the continuation of the 9 year old Austin, Texas based Public-access television cable TV show called The Reel Deal...
it received their highest rating of 'Better Than Sex!'. IGN listed District 9 as 24 on a list of the 25 Great Sci-Fi films ever.
Sara Vilkomerson of The New York Observer wrote, "District 9 is the most exciting science fiction movie to come along in ages; definitely the most thrilling film of the summer; and quite possibly the best film I've seen all year." Christy Lemire
Christy Lemire
Christy Lemire is the film critic for The Associated Press and co-host of Ebert Presents at the Movies with Ignatiy Vishnevetsky. She also co-hosts the weekly online movie review show, What The Flick?!....
from the Associated Press
Associated Press
The Associated Press is an American news agency. The AP is a cooperative owned by its contributing newspapers, radio and television stations in the United States, which both contribute stories to the AP and use material written by its staff journalists...
was impressed by the plot and thematic content, claiming that "District 9 has the aesthetic trappings of science fiction but it's really more of a character drama, an examination of how a man responds when he's forced to confront his identity during extraordinary circumstances." Entertainment Weekly
Entertainment Weekly
Entertainment Weekly is an American magazine, published by the Time division of Time Warner, that covers film, television, music, broadway theatre, books and popular culture...
s Lisa Schwarzbaum described it as "... madly original, cheekily political, [and] altogether exciting ..."
Roger Ebert
Roger Ebert
Roger Joseph Ebert is an American film critic and screenwriter. He is the first film critic to win a Pulitzer Prize for Criticism.Ebert is known for his film review column and for the television programs Sneak Previews, At the Movies with Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert, and Siskel and Ebert and The...
praised the film for "giving us aliens to remind us not everyone who comes in a spaceship need be angelic, octopod or stainless steel," but complains that "... the third act is disappointing, involving standard shoot-out action. No attempt is made to resolve the situation, and if that's a happy ending, I've seen happier. Despite its creativity, the film remains space opera
Space opera
Space opera is a subgenre of science fiction that emphasizes romantic, often melodramatic adventure, set mainly or entirely in outer space, generally involving conflict between opponents possessing advanced technologies and abilities. The term has no relation to music and it is analogous to "soap...
and avoids the higher realms of science-fiction." New York Press
New York Press
New York Press was a free alternative weekly in New York City, that was published from 1988 to 2011. During its lifetime, it was the main competitor to the Village Voice...
critic Armond White
Armond White
Armond White is a New York-based film and music critic known for his provocative and idiosyncratic film criticism, which some have characterized as contrarian. He is currently the editor of City Arts, for which he also writes articles and reviews...
lambasted the film for its outlandish premise and perceived racial insensitivity toward its apartheid allegories. He asserts that "Blomkamp and Jackson want it every which way: The actuality-video threat of The Blair Witch Project
The Blair Witch Project
The Blair Witch Project is a 1999 American horror film pieced together from amateur footage. The film was produced by the Haxan Films production company. The film relates the story of three student filmmakers The Blair Witch Project is a 1999 American horror film pieced together from amateur...
, unstoppable violence like ID4
Independence Day (film)
Independence Day is a 1996 science fiction film about an alien invasion of Earth, focusing on a disparate group of individuals and families as they converge in the Nevada desert and, along with the rest of the human population, participate in a last-chance counterattack on July 4 – the same...
plus Spielberg's otherworldly benevolence: factitiousness, killing and cosmic agape. This is how cinema gets turned into trash." The review was initially defended by Roger Ebert, but soon after Ebert referred to White as a troll
Troll (Internet)
In Internet slang, a troll is someone who posts inflammatory, extraneous, or off-topic messages in an online community, such as an online discussion forum, chat room, or blog, with the primary intent of provoking readers into an emotional response...
though White countered that Ebert was in fact the troll, claiming Ebert was pressured by his employers to retract his support. Josh Tyler of Cinema Blend
Cinema Blend
Cinema Blend is a website founded and run by Josh Tyler dedicated to news and reviews of upcoming and currently playing films, movie projects, Television Shows, and a newly founded Music section which covers album reviews, band interviews and daily news from the industry. It combines gossip from...
says the film is unique in interpretation and execution, but considers it to be a knockoff of the 1988 film Alien Nation
Alien Nation (film)
Alien Nation is a 1988 American science fiction film directed by Graham Baker and produced by Gale Anne Hurd, Richard Kobritz and Bill Borden. The storyline was based on a screenplay written by Rockne S. O'Bannon. It stars James Caan, Mandy Patinkin, Terence Stamp, and Kevyn Major Howard...
.
Controversy
| "The idea that it's not only Nigerians, but all Africans who behave in that way, will be spread across the world. I find that to be a painful thought. The manner in which the Nigerians are depicted cannot be justified." |
| —Hakeem Kae-Kazim |
Many Nigerians, both in the country and abroad, were deeply offended by the film. Nigeria's Information Minister Dora Akunyili
Dora Akunyili
Dora Nkem Akunyili is the former Director General of National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control of Nigeria and former Nigerian Minister of Information and Communications...
asked movie theatres around the country to either ban the film or edit out specific references to the country, because of the film's negative depiction of the Nigerian characters as criminals and cannibals. Letters of complaint were sent to the producer and distributor of the film demanding an apology. She also said the gang leader Obesandjo is almost identical in spelling and pronunciation to the surname of former president Olusegun Obasanjo. The film was later banned in Nigeria; the Nigerian Film and Video Censors Board was asked to prevent cinemas from showing the film and also to confiscate it.
Many Nigerians also accused District 9 of being xenophobic. Online petitions and Facebook groups called "District 9 Hates Nigerians" were started. Hakeem Kae-Kazim
Hakeem Kae-Kazim
Hakeem Kae-Kazim , sometimes credited as "Hakim Kae Kazim", is an actor who played Georges Rutaganda on Hotel Rwanda in 2004 directed by Terry George...
, a British born Nigerian actor also criticized the portrayal of Nigerians in the film, telling the Beeld newspaper Africa is a beautiful place and the problems it does have can not be shown by such a small group of people.
Accolades
District 9 was named one of the top 10 independent films of 2009 by the National Board of Review of Motion PicturesNational Board of Review of Motion Pictures
The National Board of Review of Motion Pictures was founded in 1909 in New York City, just 13 years after the birth of cinema, to protest New York City Mayor George B. McClellan, Jr.'s revocation of moving-picture exhibition licenses on Christmas Eve 1908. The mayor believed that the new medium...
. The film received four Academy Awards
Academy Awards
An Academy Award, also known as an Oscar, is an accolade bestowed by the American Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to recognize excellence of professionals in the film industry, including directors, actors, and writers...
nominations, seven British Academy Film Awards
British Academy Film Awards
The British Academy Film Awards are presented in an annual award show hosted by the British Academy of Film and Television Arts . It is the British counterpart of the Oscars. As of 2008, it has taken place in the Royal Opera House, having taken over from the flagship Odeon cinema on Leicester Square...
nominations, five Broadcast Film Critics Association
Broadcast Film Critics Association
The Broadcast Film Critics Association is the largest film critics organization in the United States and Canada , representing approximately 250 television, radio and online critics....
nominations, and one Golden Globe nomination. It is the fourth film ever nominated for Best Picture at the Academy Awards
Academy Awards
An Academy Award, also known as an Oscar, is an accolade bestowed by the American Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to recognize excellence of professionals in the film industry, including directors, actors, and writers...
for TriStar Pictures
TriStar Pictures
TriStar Pictures, Inc. is an American film production/distribution studio and subsidiary of Columbia Pictures, itself a subdivision of the Columbia TriStar Motion Picture Group, which is owned by Sony Pictures...
behind As Good as It Gets
As Good as It Gets
As Good as It Gets is a 1997 American romantic comedy film directed by James L. Brooks and produced by Laura Ziskin. It stars Jack Nicholson as a misanthropic, obsessive-compulsive novelist, Helen Hunt as a single mother with an asthmatic son, and Greg Kinnear as a gay artist. The screenplay was...
, Jerry Maguire
Jerry Maguire
Jerry Maguire is a 1996 American romantic comedy-drama film starring Tom Cruise and Cuba Gooding, Jr. It was written, co-produced, and directed by Cameron Crowe...
and Bugsy
Bugsy
Bugsy is a 1991 American crime-drama film which tells the story of mobster Bugsy Siegel. It stars Warren Beatty, Annette Bening, Harvey Keitel, Ben Kingsley, Elliott Gould, Joe Mantegna, Bebe Neuwirth, and Bill Graham....
. It won the 2009 Bradbury Award
Bradbury Award
The Ray Bradbury Award is presented by the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America to recognize excellence in screenwriting...
from the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America
Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America
Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America, or SFWA is a nonprofit association of professional science fiction and fantasy writers. It was founded in 1965 by Damon Knight under the name Science Fiction Writers of America, Inc. and it retains the acronym SFWA after a very brief use of the SFFWA...
.
Home media
The Blu-ray DiscBlu-ray Disc
Blu-ray Disc is an optical disc storage medium designed to supersede the DVD format. The plastic disc is 120 mm in diameter and 1.2 mm thick, the same size as DVDs and CDs. Blu-ray Discs contain 25 GB per layer, with dual layer discs being the norm for feature-length video discs...
and Region 1 Code
DVD region code
DVD region codes are a digital-rights management technique designed to allow film distributors to control aspects of a release, including content, release date, and price, according to the region...
widescreen
Widescreen
Widescreen images are a variety of aspect ratios used in film, television and computer screens. In film, a widescreen film is any film image with a width-to-height aspect ratio greater than the standard 1.37:1 Academy aspect ratio provided by 35mm film....
edition of District 9 as well as the 2-disc special edition version on DVD
DVD-Video
DVD-Video is a consumer video format used to store digital video on DVD discs, and is currently the dominant consumer video format in Asia, North America, Europe, and Australia. Discs using the DVD-Video specification require a DVD drive and a MPEG-2 decoder...
was released on December 22, 2009. The DVD and Blu-ray Disc includes the documentary "The Alien Agenda: A Filmmaker's Log" and the special features "Metamorphosis: The Transformation of Wikus", "Innovation: Acting and Improvisation", "Conception and Design: Creating the World of District 9", and "Alien Generation: Visual Effects". The demo for the video game God of War III
God of War III
God of War III is an action-adventure video game released by Sony Computer Entertainment's Santa Monica division for the PlayStation 3 in March 2010...
featured in the 2009 Electronic Entertainment Expo
Electronic Entertainment Expo 2009
The Electronic Entertainment Expo 2009, commonly known as the E3 2009, was the 15th Electronic Entertainment Expo held. The event took place on June 2, 3, and 4 at the Los Angeles Convention Center. E3 is an annual trade show for the computer and video games industry presented by the Entertainment...
is also included with the Blu-ray release of District 9 playable on the Sony PlayStation 3
PlayStation 3
The is the third home video game console produced by Sony Computer Entertainment and the successor to the PlayStation 2 as part of the PlayStation series. The PlayStation 3 competes with Microsoft's Xbox 360 and Nintendo's Wii as part of the seventh generation of video game consoles...
.
Sequel
On August 1, 2009, two weeks before District 9 was released to cinemas, Neill Blomkamp hinted that he intended to make a sequel if the film was successful enough. During an interview on the "Rude Awakening" 94.7 Highveld Stereo94.7 Highveld Stereo
94.7 Highveld Stereo is a radio station that broadcasts on the 94.7FM frequency from Johannesburg, Gauteng, South Africa.- History :The station first went on the air on September 1, 1964, as the first SABC regional FM service, Radio Highveld. At that time the station broadcast hourly news bulletins...
breakfast radio show, he alluded to it, saying "There probably will be." Nevertheless, he revealed that his next project is unrelated to the District 9 universe.
In an interview with Rotten Tomatoes
Rotten Tomatoes
Rotten Tomatoes is a website devoted to reviews, information, and news of films—widely known as a film review aggregator. Its name derives from the cliché of audiences throwing tomatoes and other vegetables at a poor stage performance...
, Blomkamp stated that he was "totally" hoping for a follow-up: "I haven't thought of a story yet but if people want to see another one, I'd love to do it."
Blomkamp has posed the possibility of the next movie in the series being a prequel
Prequel
A prequel is a work that supplements a previously completed one, and has an earlier time setting.The widely recognized term was a 20th-century neologism, and a portmanteau from pre- and sequel...
.
In an interview with Empire magazine posted on April 28, 2010, Sharlto Copley suggested that a follow-up, while very likely, would be about two years away, given his and Neill Blomkamp's current commitments.