District 9

Sorry for the delay in this review; I didn't see District 9 until it'd been out for a week or so, and just finished writing my review today. Here's an excerpt, with a link to the rest:

A very impressive, promising debut. I think the message was a little on the simplistic side, and I would've liked to have seen a fresher take that emphasized the way bureaucratic organizations can create and obscure moral tragedies without even meaning to. It opts for retread antagonists, instead, but the rest of the tale is too engaging for any of this to bring the movie down much.

I was particularly pleased with the way the film built to the outburst of action in its third act in a completely organic way. It never felt as if the violence was ramped off merely because the film needed a boffo third act; it all happened because it had to, given what had come before it.

now here is a movie that i will definitely be seeing when it comes over here...looks different (as in more realistic) from your average sci-fi, special effect, whatever, movie.

My teens and I saw this movie over the weekend.

I expected an Enemy Mine kind of scenario and it had some of that in it but it was updated to what teens these days love with tons of special effects, some shaky cam (but thankfully not too much) and much action.

After seeing it I also got shades of Predator, and two of Morgan Spurlock's 30 days shows. Those two shows being the one from when Morgan spent 30 days on a reservation and the one when he put a border guard living with an illegal Mexican family.

My teens LOVED this film. My 16 year old says it's the best movie he has ever seen!

My 18 year old enjoyed it a great deal as well.

As for me, I was relieved it didn't suck. I thought it was pretty good. I could have done without some of the gore and shaky cam. I could have enjoyed more story particularly into the aliens.

One thing I think it didn't really get into but which was implied is the theory that if there is no Alpha, one of the betas will change into an Alpha. They said that it looked like all the leaders had died leaving only directionless workers.

I thought it was pretty neat that they had someone step up. True he did it in a way that was covert. It was probably not widely known among his people that he was the alpha. It seemed only to be known by two others.

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Bleacheddecay

OK, I finally got around to seeing August's major movies (at least, two of them), so I can comment on District 9. I might as well tell you up front that I give it . I will agree, up to a point, that it's an original concept, but even so, I was strongly reminded for obvious reasons of several other films. Both versions of The Fly came to mind, and I'll admit that Sarah hit it on the nose that the original might have been more-influential. Besides that, Independence Day, Children of Men, Aliens, Robocop 2 (or Iron Man if you can't think that far back), all cried out to me at various times. My wife Brenda was grabbing my arm, hard, at several times. At first, it was just because it was all so damn intense, and afterwards, when you totally got into the Christopher character, she said that she really wanted him and his son to get back to their family just like she wanted Tom Hanks' character to get back to his wife in Saving Private Ryan.

I'm not sure what else to add which hasn't been said. I did laugh at quite a few of the deaths. I thought the inclusion of the Nigerians was a masterstroke, but I need to ask our friend no1mccoy what he thinks because I laughed at their wastocity. I really don't understand the complaints about the film's score. There are many different kinds of African music, but since much of the film was shot in Soweto, it makes sense that you would hear music from Soweto, one of the continent's and definitely South Africa's touchstone for apartheid and civil rights. There would be no sense in setting the flick in South Africa and Soweto unless it included appropriate music. Rwanda and South Africa are thousands of miles apart, so learn about African music if you're going to discuss it.

The film is definitely set up for a sequel: District 10, and it's ripe for story strands from both lead characters, one I never even mentioned by name here in this post.

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It's what you learn after you know it all that counts. - John Wooden
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I liked the music, A lot. Why would anyone complain about the music? Sure did enjoy the movie. I think your rating is spot on Mr. Eff.

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We are both the source of the problem and the solution, yet we do not see ourselves in this light...

Is anyone else bothered by all the plot holes in this film?

Seems no one is really commenting on the main story and the aspects of the plot that don't make sense and all of the problems it had.

I can't think of any egregious plot holes off the top of my head. Mind elaborating (with spoiler tags, of course)?

I'd like to hear as well.

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"Don't be so gloomy. After all it's not that awful. Like the fella says, in Italy for 30 years under the Borgias they had warfare, terror, murder, and bloodshed, but they produced Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci, and the Renaissance. In Switzerland they had brotherly love - they had 500 years of democracy and peace, and what did that produce? The cuckoo clock."

Sure, I'll elaborate a bit. First time trying the spoiler tags so hopefully I get them right.

The dang spoiler thing isn't working for me.

SPOILER SPOILER SPOILER

I believe that although Christopher said that he was going to get help he also stated that they could not return home. Obviously something happened on their home planet, causing them to become refugees, they probably have a bunch of scouting ships or something. They may have had the advanced weaponry, but we have nukes and biological weapons. They are refugees, they do not want to be exterminated. They want to thrive, build their numbers so as not to be so threatened. And when referring to them fighting like animals for food, remember they are refugees, with nowhere else to go.

At least what I thought, it leaves it open ended for the viewer to figure out.

What are you referring to?

You did!

Another one that kind of comes off as an epic plot-hole is that the movie is set in reasonably modern times and nothing much is different rather than the aliens coming to Earth - although the world is very different in that MNU basically controls the entire planet.

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I wonder why it wouldn't work for me there Yoda.

edit: I don't get what you're saying there Meat. Christopher mentioned that their technology is biotech stuff. And you're "epic plot-hole" is not a plot-hole.

Some of the back story is mostly left uncovered. They do go into detail about how some of the aliens are "drones" and some are more "intelligent', but after 20 years, the Earthlings seem to think that the intelligent aliens disappeared when that "ship" disappeared even though it seemed to fall to the desert.

Do we need to know why the aliens ran out of fuel? Is that really a plot hole? You have to remember that this film had to supply a back story which covered 20 years and did so quickly enough to get people involved with what was happening in the "present day". Therefore, a film as complex and sophisticated as this should be allowed to pick and choose its significant plot points before it's called majorly-flawed like a film which starts from a "dead stop".

It caught me off-guard and isn't really explained throughout , but apparently MNU has major control over world politics - if they have the authority to deal with the aliens.

I was under the impression that MNU was local. Otherwise, I would have expected to hear some different accents.

Yeah, they have a crucial job, but I don't think they need worldwide power. The aliens landed in Johannesburg, after all, so I don't have much trouble believing that they were left to deal with it.

Either way, the fact that 20 years has passed and an otherwise amazing thing has become mundane and depressing is part of the point the film is making, I think, and it's one of the things that makes it so interesting. We, the audience, come at it from an entirely different perspective than the people in the film, for whom the amazement has faded, and all that's left in its place is an impossible problem.

The aliens' ability to use weapons is supposed to be due to genetics. However, we don't know why they were almost immovable when their mothership was invaded by the Earthlings, and it appears that the Earthlings removed most all of their weapons at that time when they were weakest. Of course, there's always the "Secret Info" reason: Payback in a Sequel!!