Let's face it: I play Devil's advocate a lot. When someone has an argument about something, I will tend to rub it the wrong way because someone has to represent the other side. Sometimes I'm right, sometimes not. With that said, I've seen a lot of threads and a lot of reviews saying "best movie of the year" or "if this doesn't win Oscars, I've lost faith in movies" and even folks going so far as to say "you won't see a better movie all year".
Well, fall season hasn't hit, so the last statement seems incorrect, and if you go by aggregate scores, Drag Me To Hell scored higher than District 9. As far as it winning Oscars, I don't really see it happening...especially since none of the CGI characters evoked anything close to Gollum. As for being the best movie of the year...definitely "one of". There is a lot going on in District 9, and even at a somewhat compressed-feeling 2 hour running time, there hasn't been as honest and as vibrant of a sci-fi movie in quite a while.
Without going into details of the plot at all, District 9 starts out as a documentary-style movie, following Wikus van der Merwe as he heads up the eviction of 1.8 million "prawns" from District 9. In the meantime, something bad happens, and he eventually finds himself caught in the middle of something he doesn't want. I could go on and on about the story (especially how I feel that most people walking out of the theatre were wrong about who the villains really were in the film)...but in the end, it was a good and solid piece of filmmaking. There is a handful of stuff that you can tell came from the rejected Halo movie project, as the MNU features familiar-looking assault rifles, and the "prawns" definitely feel a bit like the Covenant in some ways. However, there is something in District 9 that Halo is still lacking: heart. This movie has it, but in some of the oddest ways. There were plenty of times that I found myself conflicted with who to root for, and there were even more times where I was scratching my head going "well yeah, but this and this happened beforehand, so you're wrong!". The movie does have its ridiculous moments (the idea of interspecies sex and a group of Nigerian voodoo believers eating the alien's body parts) that show you Peter Jackson had some involvement in the project. Then again, anyone unfamiliar with Jackson's earlier work like Dead Alive or Bad Taste probably won't understand the necessity for the attention to gross-out vomiting and gore. He definitely proves that he knows how to make it sloppy, nasty, and gag-worthy. It's tough to make me want to wretch, but there's just something about a man's fingernails being ripped off that can do it every time...
The thing that captivated me about the movie was not necessarily the movie, but the contradictions and contrasts found in what the movie is saying vs. the audience's reaction. I found it interesting that the audience would not root for a human killing an alien, nor would they root when an alien killed a human, but they would root whenever our half-man/half-alien (the only spoiler you'll get is that Wikus contracts a disease that starts turning him into an alien, but you probably figured that out from the trailers) kills someone or something. For some reason, that character and his journey end up making it okay to laugh at someone being brutally blown up into bloody chunks. It made me start thinking: have we desensitized ourselves too much with movies and media that something this bad (and you can even see in Wikus' eyes for a while that he hates that he did it) is laughable? Maybe I'm supposed to go into this film and take it in for being just another "hapless character turns into hapless hero" story, but I just don't see it that way...and I also don't see the humans as the bad guys. I don't see them as the good guys either, but I do see them as the victims in an elaborate plan that...to be honest...I think I could be reading too far into and makes me almost feel like a conspiracy theorist digging for answers.
Part of the problem with digging for answers, which many fans of sci-fi will no doubt do, is that the movie could've done for a little more length to explain things a tad bit more thoroughly. Then again, had the movie been longer and explained a bit more, then it wouldn't have that appeal of digging that sci-fi fans enjoy so well. Trying to over-intellectualize something beyond what it may or may not be is science fiction tradition, and it almost feels like Neill and Peter purposefully set District 9 up to do just that. It's a good thing, don't get me wrong, but it will no doubt lead to many pretentious debates and discussions that will make people outside of sci-fi norm say "whatever".
The documentary style of the film seems to turn a lot of people off from the movie (so I've heard from at least seven people), but the movie does eventually land into the action movie cliches that we know quite well. It handles them well, even if the cliches make the film feel a tad bit disjointed from the documentary portions. Nonetheless, the mixture feels fresh enough that people will be misusing the word "original" a lot. In gamer terms, it's kind of like Dead Space: it has few to no original parts, but the parts that it does have happen to be very well done.
Would I recommend District 9 to everyone? No. It's not going to appeal to the group of people that enjoy a typical summer blockbuster. Will sci-fi fans enjoy it? I'm more than positive they'll like it, and there will be many that claim "best movie of the year". They'll hail it as a fucking Messiah for sci-fi movies. It is not a Messiah, however. It's a well-done movie produced by a guy that does well-done movies and helped guide the hand of a director that had a good idea of what he is doing. The film doesn't really break any boundaries either, as it features all the staples you would find in a good sci-fi and action movie.
Therefore, folks, just take the movie for what it is:
A damn good sci-fi movie.
District 9: The jakob187 Review (NO SPOILERS)
Let's face it: I play Devil's advocate a lot. When someone has an argument about something, I will tend to rub it the wrong way because someone has to represent the other side. Sometimes I'm right, sometimes not. With that said, I've seen a lot of threads and a lot of reviews saying "best movie of the year" or "if this doesn't win Oscars, I've lost faith in movies" and even folks going so far as to say "you won't see a better movie all year".
Well, fall season hasn't hit, so the last statement seems incorrect, and if you go by aggregate scores, Drag Me To Hell scored higher than District 9. As far as it winning Oscars, I don't really see it happening...especially since none of the CGI characters evoked anything close to Gollum. As for being the best movie of the year...definitely "one of". There is a lot going on in District 9, and even at a somewhat compressed-feeling 2 hour running time, there hasn't been as honest and as vibrant of a sci-fi movie in quite a while.
Without going into details of the plot at all, District 9 starts out as a documentary-style movie, following Wikus van der Merwe as he heads up the eviction of 1.8 million "prawns" from District 9. In the meantime, something bad happens, and he eventually finds himself caught in the middle of something he doesn't want. I could go on and on about the story (especially how I feel that most people walking out of the theatre were wrong about who the villains really were in the film)...but in the end, it was a good and solid piece of filmmaking. There is a handful of stuff that you can tell came from the rejected Halo movie project, as the MNU features familiar-looking assault rifles, and the "prawns" definitely feel a bit like the Covenant in some ways. However, there is something in District 9 that Halo is still lacking: heart. This movie has it, but in some of the oddest ways. There were plenty of times that I found myself conflicted with who to root for, and there were even more times where I was scratching my head going "well yeah, but this and this happened beforehand, so you're wrong!". The movie does have its ridiculous moments (the idea of interspecies sex and a group of Nigerian voodoo believers eating the alien's body parts) that show you Peter Jackson had some involvement in the project. Then again, anyone unfamiliar with Jackson's earlier work like Dead Alive or Bad Taste probably won't understand the necessity for the attention to gross-out vomiting and gore. He definitely proves that he knows how to make it sloppy, nasty, and gag-worthy. It's tough to make me want to wretch, but there's just something about a man's fingernails being ripped off that can do it every time...
The thing that captivated me about the movie was not necessarily the movie, but the contradictions and contrasts found in what the movie is saying vs. the audience's reaction. I found it interesting that the audience would not root for a human killing an alien, nor would they root when an alien killed a human, but they would root whenever our half-man/half-alien (the only spoiler you'll get is that Wikus contracts a disease that starts turning him into an alien, but you probably figured that out from the trailers) kills someone or something. For some reason, that character and his journey end up making it okay to laugh at someone being brutally blown up into bloody chunks. It made me start thinking: have we desensitized ourselves too much with movies and media that something this bad (and you can even see in Wikus' eyes for a while that he hates that he did it) is laughable? Maybe I'm supposed to go into this film and take it in for being just another "hapless character turns into hapless hero" story, but I just don't see it that way...and I also don't see the humans as the bad guys. I don't see them as the good guys either, but I do see them as the victims in an elaborate plan that...to be honest...I think I could be reading too far into and makes me almost feel like a conspiracy theorist digging for answers.
Part of the problem with digging for answers, which many fans of sci-fi will no doubt do, is that the movie could've done for a little more length to explain things a tad bit more thoroughly. Then again, had the movie been longer and explained a bit more, then it wouldn't have that appeal of digging that sci-fi fans enjoy so well. Trying to over-intellectualize something beyond what it may or may not be is science fiction tradition, and it almost feels like Neill and Peter purposefully set District 9 up to do just that. It's a good thing, don't get me wrong, but it will no doubt lead to many pretentious debates and discussions that will make people outside of sci-fi norm say "whatever".
The documentary style of the film seems to turn a lot of people off from the movie (so I've heard from at least seven people), but the movie does eventually land into the action movie cliches that we know quite well. It handles them well, even if the cliches make the film feel a tad bit disjointed from the documentary portions. Nonetheless, the mixture feels fresh enough that people will be misusing the word "original" a lot. In gamer terms, it's kind of like Dead Space: it has few to no original parts, but the parts that it does have happen to be very well done.
Would I recommend District 9 to everyone? No. It's not going to appeal to the group of people that enjoy a typical summer blockbuster. Will sci-fi fans enjoy it? I'm more than positive they'll like it, and there will be many that claim "best movie of the year". They'll hail it as a fucking Messiah for sci-fi movies. It is not a Messiah, however. It's a well-done movie produced by a guy that does well-done movies and helped guide the hand of a director that had a good idea of what he is doing. The film doesn't really break any boundaries either, as it features all the staples you would find in a good sci-fi and action movie.
Therefore, folks, just take the movie for what it is:
A damn good sci-fi movie.
I have no idea what this movie is even about, and almost no desire to see it. But whenever anything gets repeatedly hailed as "Best evar" I know almost instantly there is a good chance I will not like it. I'll have to give this a go and see how I feel about it.
It was all right. I don't understand the hype as a quarter of the way through I pretty much had guessed correctly how it was going to end.
" @The_A_Drain: I know the feeling you're talking about. All the hype just doesn't seem like it'll be something you'll agree with, and it turns you away from it. I think there is definitely a lot of overhype on this, but it doesn't mean it's a bad movie. "
Yeah, fortunately though i'd literally never heard of the movie until this weekend so I might give it a go sometime. Although when I heard "CG characters" I facepalmed, the only movie to ever pull that off 100% succesfully imo was The Two Towers, he's not in enough of Fellowship to comment, and in Return of the King I found him annoying as hell. But Gollum is about the only CG character in a live action movie i've ever been able to stand.
Roger Rabbit withstanding but that's not CG is it? It's hand drawn isn't it?
But yeha, my point is when I hear "CG character" I switch off instantly.
I feel like they should have either more fully fleshed out the documentary style or dropped it altogether; it seemed like an afterthought in the film. That being said, still a great film. The reason it was a notch above most recent sci-fi films with aliens was because it broke the standard conventions of it's genre. Personally the best film I've seen this summer (not like it had much competition, ahem...) and one of the best so far this year.
@kmdrkul: What standard conventions did it break? The majority of that movie was cliche. The only thing it did differently was that it told its backstory through the form of a documentary, and I liked how they did that. Unfortunately, there comes a point in the movie when it's not a documentary and it quickly becomes a movie like all others, making you wonder who is filming it all. Other than that, it does nothing honestly unique and different. There's political and social commentary as most sci-fi movies have, and there is the race issue...which is definitely not something strange to sci-fi (see Alien Nation, Twilight Zone's "Eye of the Beholder" episode, Star Trek, etc).
Like every movie I will use my own judgement.
I dunno if it can top Watchmen for my favorite movie of the year, but if it does, then it'll be pretty fucking good.
BTW Jakob have you watched the extended Watchmen? They added a significant amount.
Cool review.
In all honesty, I was a little let down by D9. I certainly enjoyed it, but it almost doesn't feel finished. It ended up being more of a popcorn movie than an epic, which is fine, but not what hoping for. I realize it's my own fault for setting expectations too high, but I feel like it could have been so much more. Oh well.
I thought the movie was kind of meh. It wasn't terrible but I found myself being very bored for the first half of the film and not really caring what was happening. At times, I actually considered walking out but I figured I paid 10 bucks, I might as well see if it gets any better and to be honest, it did but not enough to make me want to see the movie again. I definitely don't agree with everyone claiming the is the greatest movie of the year and I honestly don't see why it is getting so much praise. Oh well, I guess its just not my kind of movie
@kmdrkul: What standard conventions did it break? The majority of that movie was cliche. The only thing it did differently was that it told its backstory through the form of a documentary, and I liked how they did that. Unfortunately, there comes a point in the movie when it's not a documentary and it quickly becomes a movie like all others, making you wonder who is filming it all. Other than that, it does nothing honestly unique and different. There's political and social commentary as most sci-fi movies have, and there is the race issue...which is definitely not something strange to sci-fi (see Alien Nation, Twilight Zone's "Eye of the Beholder" episode, Star Trek, etc). "
Warning; Spoilers ahead
- No back story as to how the aliens settled over the city
- Aliens capable of communicating with each other coherently
- Aliens not being the aggressor
- No clear good vs. evil
- Aliens capable of exhibiting emotion
- Humans didn't accomplish their goal
- Protagonist ultimately failed
You must be confused as to what the term convention means. Breaking convention =/= originality per say; other films may have done some of those things above, but convention equals the standard or the norm... last time I checked there was an overwhelming amount of movies with aliens as the bad guys, IE making aliens as bad guys a typical sci-fi convention.
Really I failed to see how besides the fact that it was a movie with aliens (and with that comes the typical spaceships/weapons/etc) that the story of this film was cliched at all.
- Yes, they did. You probably just didn't catch it. Hint hint: "We go home now?" "We can't go back home".
- Do you mean aliens and humans communicating? That's been done plenty of times before. It's also been done between aliens plenty of times.
- How do YOU know the aliens weren't the bad guys? I can site plenty of reasons why they are the bad guys.
- This is partially true. Nonetheless, I feel that there is enough evidence to show that the aliens are clear cut villains and humans are the victims.
- Romulans don't show emotion? E.T.? I think you mean "aliens were anthropomorphic"...since they were basically taking on human traits in the movie...like Bugs Bunny.
- Humans did accomplish their goal: they moved the aliens from District 9 to District 10. That was the goal set out at the beginning of the movie. The weaponry thing was the "real" goal of it all, sure...but they haven't failed it yet, as there are still 2.5 million aliens on the planet.
- Protagonist didn't fail. His wife still loves him, and homie alien said he'd be back in three years.
Meanwhile, here's the list of cliches...in order...as best as I can remember them:
- Guy gets appointed fresh new promotion for dangerous mission
- Guy gets screwed on mission
- Guy is taken by organization for experiments due to getting screwed, then turns back on him
- Guy escapes by taking hostage, then turns to enemies for help
- Enemies willing to help, but they both must go back to the place where guy escapes
- Enemy finds terrifying secret
- Guy screws over enemy to save his own ass
- Guy sacrifices self to save enemy because he feels it's for the right cause
The majority of the movie is a cliche. However, I'm not saying that's a bad thing. It's very interesting how they play it all out, and they used those cliches well. Unfortunately, people are going to claim this movie's "originality" when it's not about originality, but a freshness to the standard cliches that makes it a good movie.
" @kmdrkul: To bullet your bullets:That was far from telling us how they got there. Also, I'd love to hear how you think the aliens were bad guys... that's definitely an interesting debate. In fact, I think maybe we should continue our discussion in private message form?
- Yes, they did. You probably just didn't catch it. Hint hint: "We go home now?" "We can't go back home".
- Do you mean aliens and humans communicating? That's been done plenty of times before. It's also been done between aliens plenty of times.
- How do YOU know the aliens weren't the bad guys? I can site plenty of reasons why they are the bad guys.
- This is partially true. Nonetheless, I feel that there is enough evidence to show that the aliens are clear cut villains and humans are the victims.
- Romulans don't show emotion? E.T.? I think you mean "aliens were anthropomorphic"...since they were basically taking on human traits in the movie...like Bugs Bunny.
- Humans did accomplish their goal: they moved the aliens from District 9 to District 10. That was the goal set out at the beginning of the movie. The weaponry thing was the "real" goal of it all, sure...but they haven't failed it yet, as there are still 2.5 million aliens on the planet.
- Protagonist didn't fail. His wife still loves him, and homie alien said he'd be back in three years.
Meanwhile, here's the list of cliches...in order...as best as I can remember them:
- Guy gets appointed fresh new promotion for dangerous mission
- Guy gets screwed on mission
- Guy is taken by organization for experiments due to getting screwed, then turns back on him
- Guy escapes by taking hostage, then turns to enemies for help
- Enemies willing to help, but they both must go back to the place where guy escapes
- Enemy finds terrifying secret
- Guy screws over enemy to save his own ass
- Guy sacrifices self to save enemy because he feels it's for the right cause
"
The majority of the movie is a cliche. However, I'm not saying that's a bad thing. It's very interesting how they play it all out, and they used those cliches well. Unfortunately, people are going to claim this movie's "originality" when it's not about originality, but a freshness to the standard cliches that makes it a good movie.
I loved the movie. It had a real message about fairness in our sociaty and are hostility to the unknown. Towards the end it had a crap ton of action, and the aliens were portraited very realistically and believably. A little kid alien was in the movie and everyone in the theater loved it :3
The worst cliche of all was the "go on without me!" "no!" "Please! I'm begging you!" exchange. It was almost laughable and it really took me out of the movie.
You bring up a really nice point that I haven't seen anybody else discuss yet:@jakob187 said:
The thing that captivated me about the movie was not necessarily the movie, but the contradictions and contrasts found in what the movie is saying vs. the audience's reaction. I found it interesting that the audience would not root for a human killing an alien, nor would they root when an alien killed a human, but they would root whenever our half-man/half-alien (the only spoiler you'll get is that Wikus contracts a disease that starts turning him into an alien, but you probably figured that out from the trailers) kills someone or something. For some reason, that character and his journey end up making it okay to laugh at someone being brutally blown up into bloody chunks. It made me start thinking: have we desensitized ourselves too much with movies and media that something this bad (and you can even see in Wikus' eyes for a while that he hates that he did it) is laughable?This is definitely something I was thinking about when I was watching the film. You see humans kill aliens with no regard, and it leaves a stark, cold feeling in you. You see aliens dismember humans, and the same feeling occurs. And then Wikus gains the power to blow people into mush with little more than a bat of his eyelashes, and he does so many times. I think it's apparent that he's at first very apprehensive about doing this, but since those men stand in the way of completing his mission, I think he warms up to the idea. Seeing people and aliens die in this movie never got easier. Watching people explode how they did was really hard, perhaps because of the air of veritas that the movie is shrouded in.
SPOILERS
Beginning of the movie, what fell from the mothership? It was the small ship that ended up being under the shack. The aliens had the weaponry to go down and get it back. Why didn't they? They were dying? REALLY? Dood, if you locked me in a ship without food for three months, guess what would happen? The aliens weren't pitstopping at Earth. They were working on repopulating their species. Why? As they said in the movie...they can't go home. THERE IS NO HOME! The planet was blown up or devoured or whatever. Nonetheless, they hint MANY MANY MANY times that their homeworld is no more. How do we know that the population being replenished is the goal?
Well, you've got a human turning into an alien from a fuel cell's fluid. -_- It took homie alien 20 years to rummage Earth for enough alien technology to make that small fuel cell, right? 20 years to find THEIR ALIEN TECH!!! THEY WERE ON THE MOTHERSHIP FOR THREE FUCKING MONTHS!!! I'm pretty sure they had plenty of alien tech on-board to make their fuel cell. Also, isn't it miraculous how once that small ship is back with the mothership, it's good to go and homie alien just takes off? Meanwhile, as he takes off, he leaves behind 2.5 million "prawns" and a promise to Wikus that he'll be back in three years. The population went from 1.8 million to 2.5 million in the course of HOW LONG?
We can also tell that the aliens are of a hostile nature because of the brutality of their weaponry, as well as their need to hardwire their biological makeup into the weaponry in order to activate it. This disables your opponent from being able to use your weaponry against you, giving you an advantage...especially if it's a lesser race. If that wasn't enough, you can also see that they were starting violence on our planet just as much as the humans were. Plus...we shoot the aliens. They rip us apart and eat us!!!
Last but not least, we have Wikus. Wikus is the main part of it all. He gets sprayed with the fuel cell's fluid, and it ends up being a way to turn humans into aliens, right? What did homie alien say when he saw Wikus after he was sprayed? "I know what can make this happen". THE ALIENS KNOW THAT THEY CAN CHANGE ONE LIFE FORM INTO THEIR OWN KIND!!! Then, he tells him that it'll take three years to fix him. NOPE! It's going to take three years for Wikus' mind to deteriorate so he isn't Wikus anymore. We see that he retains Wikus' memory and personality at the end, and homie alien knows there is no way to turn him back. This leads me to believe that, since the "prawns" on the mothership had little to no idea of what was going on, nor their homeworld, it's safe to say that they were also either victims of this same biochemical crap or they were a new population that was just finished hatching on the ship (in case you didn't notice the same ooze all over the floor of the mothership was also in the shacks they were BREEDING EMBRYOS IN!!!).
Two aliens do not just leave 2.5 million of its race behind and then plan to return in three years to save one guy. BULLSHIT! It's a placement for global domination and repopulation. In turn, the aliens have been the villains all along, while the humans (albeit greedy, bloodthirsty, fuckhead bastards) are the victims.
It was an eradication all along, and the audience was duped into believing otherwise.
Unless Neill or Peter flat-out denies that as a possibility, then I'm pretty sure you'll find all of the evidence in the movie itself. It's another Starship Troopers scenario, except this time, it's not clearly pointed out.
" whenever anything gets repeatedly hailed as "Best evar" I know almost instantly there is a good chance I will not like it. I'll have to give this a go and see how I feel about it. "
As far as the brutality of the alien weaponry; that is true... in our eyes. Of course we interpret the weapons to be threatening, just because they are bigger than ours. Your assumptions about what the biological barrier/fingerprint is used for on all the alien weaponry are just that... assumptions. To me it was obvious why they were starting any sort of violence; they were placed in a ghetto, in a slum... historically giving a group of people very little food, and terrible living conditions does that to a group.
Unfortunately the film did not supply us with enough specifics about the piece of alien technology that permitted the aliens to fly away. We have no way of knowing A) What went into the canister directly and B) The state of the mothership.
As far as Wikus, like I said... he failed. You said it yourself; there is no way that after three years time, Wikus will still be "Wikus." But again you are trying to base your entire theory around an ominous, vague piece of dialogue? Typing it in all caps isn't going to sell anything. The prawns were placed into the new concentration camp, away from the city in isolation. The alien that left never explicitly said he was coming back *just to save Wikus,* sure, he promised Wikus that he will be back to help but that also perfectly leaves the opportunity wide open to save his fellow species as well.
Again, like I've already said... your evidence is far, far too inconclusive to warrant it being a viable interpretation of the movie. It is an interesting theory; that is all. Luckily for us, that is the joy of a movie like this...
JUST TO WARN, THERE WILL BE SPOILERS HERE..
I really liked this movie because of how ambiguous it is about the good/evil thing, really if you think about it..the whole movie is an Unreliable Narrator, normally i don't like that kind of thing in TV and Movies, but, this was a case the opposite. Heres my take, The aliens land on earth, and see how the poorer people in Johannesburg treat each other, and mimic it. Hence the parts where they talk about the aliens seeming to "enjoy violent things". The media treats the aliens like hostile creatures, although as far as we know the media in the movie is either telling the truth or stretching things out of proportion, much like real news media tends to do. If the aliens wanted to kill everyone, they could've done it, their tech is way better then ours, and who knows what kind of "Death Ray" they have on the mothership. But, once they got to Earth they decided it would be best to mimic Humans, going about violence the way humans do (burning things, derailing trains, etc, etc). The major act of aggression of the movie was something that a human did to himself. To the point of the "fuel cell" also being "crazy turn dude into alien virus" it makes sense because obviously the alien tech is all biological, so why wouldn't their fuel be biological also, i don't think you can read into it that it was really some crazy plan to make everyone aliens. Plus, with the aliens being able to reproduce as easily as they do..why would they NEED to turn people into aliens..if they wanted the planet they could 've just killed everyone.
I found myself sympathizing with the aliens a lot more then the humans, which worries me because if they make a sequel, it might be way to easy for them to go "oh guess what? THE ALIENS WERE BAD ALL ALONG" and i really hope they dont do that. IMO you see the Humans do things that are a lot worse then what the aliens do, tricking aliens into signing eviction notices, flame throwing alien baby pods. The MNU requiring aliens to have permits for computers?!
but all in all it was a great movie, there was a lot of cleche in it but i think its one of the best non-comedy movies i've seen in a while.
Yeah, I really loved the movie. I wrote a review myself and it is one of my favorite movies of the summer but it is by no means the movie of the year or, as some people said, "the decade". It was just a very well-made film that is worth watching. There is a great story behind it all and the action scenes are well-made. I loved the fact that, with a $30 million budget, they made a better action scene at the end than any scene in Transformers 2. That made me laugh.
Every time you write a review about a movie, I always read them. You have a knack it. That being said, you make me want to go see the movie now.
I am going to see it Thursday night. I can't wait! ^__^
I scrolled down as quickly as possible, but for a topic labeled no spoilers. There are ALOT of posts with the words SPOILERS
LOL
I don't have high hopes for this movie, it looks ok but nothing great. I'm hoping to be pleaseantly surprised though.
" @jakob187 said:*spoileers*" @kmdrkul: To bullet your bullets:That was far from telling us how they got there. Also, I'd love to hear how you think the aliens were bad guys... that's definitely an interesting debate. In fact, I think maybe we should continue our discussion in private message form? "
- Yes, they did. You probably just didn't catch it. Hint hint: "We go home now?" "We can't go back home".
- Do you mean aliens and humans communicating? That's been done plenty of times before. It's also been done between aliens plenty of times.
- How do YOU know the aliens weren't the bad guys? I can site plenty of reasons why they are the bad guys.
- This is partially true. Nonetheless, I feel that there is enough evidence to show that the aliens are clear cut villains and humans are the victims.
- Romulans don't show emotion? E.T.? I think you mean "aliens were anthropomorphic"...since they were basically taking on human traits in the movie...like Bugs Bunny.
- Humans did accomplish their goal: they moved the aliens from District 9 to District 10. That was the goal set out at the beginning of the movie. The weaponry thing was the "real" goal of it all, sure...but they haven't failed it yet, as there are still 2.5 million aliens on the planet.
- Protagonist didn't fail. His wife still loves him, and homie alien said he'd be back in three years.
Meanwhile, here's the list of cliches...in order...as best as I can remember them:
- Guy gets appointed fresh new promotion for dangerous mission
- Guy gets screwed on mission
- Guy is taken by organization for experiments due to getting screwed, then turns back on him
- Guy escapes by taking hostage, then turns to enemies for help
- Enemies willing to help, but they both must go back to the place where guy escapes
- Enemy finds terrifying secret
- Guy screws over enemy to save his own ass
- Guy sacrifices self to save enemy because he feels it's for the right cause
"
The majority of the movie is a cliche. However, I'm not saying that's a bad thing. It's very interesting how they play it all out, and they used those cliches well. Unfortunately, people are going to claim this movie's "originality" when it's not about originality, but a freshness to the standard cliches that makes it a good movie.
If i remember correctly, they said that the aliens got lost or something like that.
*end of spoilers*
Gonna be honest, D9 (Can I call it that? I just did so there) feels like two completely different movies mashed together.
This mashing was not subtle. In fact, I could call it quite messy. However, both parts have their own strengths and are entertaining enough in their own right.
You've got a documentary-like beginning, which I found to be the most interesting part of the movie. Then it switches gears, fairly rapidly, to an action fest.
It's great action, no doubt, and I was honestly impressed by a lot of it, but it just contrasts with the rest of the movie so much that it doesn't seem to "settle".
Basically, it's an uneven but otherwise very good movie. I'd recommend seeing it to pretty much anyone, and they could certainly enjoy it, but few will actually love the entire movie and all it offers.
I just wanted to point out that the reason Chistopher says it will take 3 years is because he has to go back to their home planet to get help because he will not stand by while his people are being experimented on and 3 years is apparently how long the trip to his home planet and then back to earth will take.That's the conversation right before Wikus knocks Chris out with the shovel.
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