District 9...Nice Place to Visit, But I Wouldn't Want to Live There

In seeing District 9, TMMC gets to put another notch on the Best Picture nominee bed post.  Five down, five to go.  I admit I would've never seen District 9 if it weren't for the Oscars.  I vividly remember seeing the preview for the first time in theaters and turning to Ebert giving it a thumbs down.  That's what I've come to do during the previews - I turn to the person who's next to me and give them the thumbs up or down after each one.  Sure I look like rain man when I see movies alone, but it's still an enjoyable pass time before the feature film begins.

From the preview, I just thought District 9 looked a bit...cheesy, for lack of a better word.  Then of course came the announcement that it was nominated for Best Picture, making it a movie I would have to see and judge for myself.

Part mockumentary, part sci-fi, part social commentary, the movie takes place in South Africa in the not so distant future.  Once again, we see the nation with an apartheid.  Except instead of a race divide this time, there's a species divide.  Yes, aliens have come down to live among us mere mortals and not everyone's swaddling E.T. and taking him on bike rides through the night sky.

Within the first five minutes of the movie I started laughing out loud at how hoaky it all seemed (literally, not like when you text lol when you're not really laughing).  I truly couldn't tell if I was supposed to take the movie seriously or find it as hilarious as I did.  It had a bit of a Sci-Fi Channel t.v. movie feel about it, with the aliens just appearing a bit too much like Muppets characters.  In fact, the derogatory slang term for the aliens is 'prawns,' and if you're familiar with The Muppets you're familiar with Pepe the King Prawn.  So here I am watching District 9 half expecting this little Muppet shrimp to run across the bottom of the screen shouting in Spanish.  Long lost twins?  Decide for yourself...

As I wiped away my tears of laughter after the first ten minutes, all of a sudden I found myself completely engaged in the story and dying to see what unfurled next.  And that's when my feelings about District 9 completely changed.  It turns out, the movie has a great deal of heart and I ended up really connecting with the characters, especially the aliens - go figure.  Even though it would probably feel like an eight foot tall crustacean, I'd give one a hug - particularly if he came with cocktail sauce. My only objection was the movie didn't personalize more of the aliens.  They gave distinct personalities to two of them and made the rest just seem like the stereotypical, untrustworthy animals the movie was trying to make the audience see past.  I really wish that hadn't been the case because it made the themes less convincing.

Speaking of the movie's themes, they were so obvious they slapped you in the head with a frying pan.  I know we can be a dense at times, but give us a bit more credit than that - we don't need everything spelled out for us.  With commentaries on segregation, discrimination, racism, violence and terrorism, at times I felt that the writer took on a bit more than could be handled.  Particularly because somewhere in the middle, the themes became a bit muddled and I couldn't help but think if they wanted to make a statement, they took the story down the wrong path.

That said, District 9 kept me enthralled throughout and deserves kudos, particularly for some great cinematography and direction. It did nag on me, however, that the movie's nominated for four Oscars.  I kept mulling it over and over in my head why this would have received such critical acclaim while in theaters.  It was good - but one of the best in 2009?  It wasn't that poor of a movie year...was it?

And then it dawned on me - District 9 was the only sci fi movie in a while that didn't need over the top special effects or explosions to be make it good.  It had what most sci fi movies lack, thought with some solid writing to engage the audience and draw them into the story.  Let us not forget, District 9 came out over the summer competing against such mind numbing blockbusters as GI Joe and Transformers II (or Trannies Too) - movies whose only legs to stand on were the OOO, AHHH factors.  I'm sorry, when people say they love these movies because they can "unplug their brains and check out" doesn't that immediately mean the movie should come with a warning clearly stating "danger, may cause severe head trauma?"  There's a time and a place for them, sure, but that doesn't make them good.

District 9 was a solid movie that I do recommend checking out.  I think the fact that it held a coherent story plot with themes that ran deeper than "good vs. evil," it blew critics away believing it was far better than it really was.  But I don't think it was great and I don't think it made the lasting impression it wanted to.  Sorry aliens...I really don't mind that you love cat food as much as you do, but I still have to give you a BREW & VIEW IT!