I found District 9 to be very clever, amusing, and at the same time very offputting. It’s clearly an anti-apartheid movie disguised as a hilariously funny satire, and at the same time very disturbing, dystopian futurist documentary. But somehow I just can’t watch much gross out stuff any more, even with a wit and a message as well delivered as that in this movie.
Maybe I’m just getting sick and tired of sci fi, I don’t know. I watch Fringe because I love Walter so much and the plot has improved tremendously, and I love Warehouse 13 and Eureka because they’re so clever and quirky. Those shows are most watchable and interesting, not overly gross at all.
I still recommend District 9, though. It really turns the alien-human perspective on its head, which was nice to see. As I said, some parts were laugh out loud funny and the satire is fantastic, plus the basic premise which is so different from most sci fi films.
A friend told me he liked it because of all the plot elements it left unanswered, such as an explanation for the aliens’ arrival. But he didn’t like calling it sci-fi. What might we call it then? Dark social satire, with some great humor along with the tragedy and ultimate hope, disguised as sci fi? He says that the stuff he likes he’s always termed speculative fiction, as it has more to do with human issues than futuristic technology. Ursula Le Guin called PK Dick “a homegrown Borges”.
As for me, I just don’t think the term speculative fiction does either the fiction or the shows justice… it’s too general and includes just about everything. I understand where my friend is coming from, though. He doesn’t want to include these more intelligently conceived social satires in the same genre as the cheesy versions of white america right or wrong… and a better description of the genre is not a bad idea.
Finally, we decided that the best of them would be more accurately termed Dystopian. As someone once put it, I’ve seen the future and it doesn’t work.
I like the idea of PK Dick as a homegrown Borges, but I’ll have to think more about that one… it’s not intuitive for me, that’s for sure. Eco reminds me much more of Borges than Dick.
Another friend liked the way it was filmed kind of like a documentary. Indeed, District 9 was filmed like a combination of those cheesy B movie sci fi/monster movies and the grainy documentaries with the air of verisimilitude. The interviewees are all really stereotypical and shallow effigies of their respective jobs, just hilarious. Wikus and his wife were laugh out loud funny, especially in conjunction with the psychologist/anthropologist type. Seeing Wikus’ transformation was very difficult, but in the end it was translational (in the religious sense of being moved or formed to a higher more refined state as to the gods) as symbolized by the eerily lovely flower that grew out of his prawn hand.