District 9 Essay

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Personal Response to Reading – Kata Brill
District 9
Brief outline of the plot
Set in the early 1980’s, a massive star ship carrying a bedraggled alien population, nicknamed "The Prawns," lands in Johannesburg, South Africa. Twenty-eight years later, the initial welcome by the human population has faded towards the outcast aliens. The refugee camp where the aliens were located has deteriorated into a militarized ghetto called District 9, where the aliens are confined and exploited living in shocking conditions. In 2010, a powerful corporation called the Multi-National United (MNU), is contracted to forcibly evict the alien population to a more controlled area appropriately named District 10. MNU agent Wikus van der Merwe is in charge of the …show more content…

Because of its past, South Africa is the perfect country to show this new type of discrimination against an entirely new intelligent species – the alien. Because of the metaphor used in the movie dealing with the issue of discrimination, the racial part can be used when viewing District 9 to identify stereotypes and power struggles between the new alien race and human beings, and also to connect these struggles to all current and past racial discrimination.
In my opinion, the mere thought of people being segregated and treated as second class citizens, like what happened in South Africa only 20 years ago is unthinkable. While the film made no mention of apartheid the overtones and analogies to its legacy were inescapable. Blomkamp who grew up in Johannesburg has stated “In my opinion, the film doesn’t exist without Johannesburg” he goes on to say "It's not like I had a story, and then I was trying to pick a city. It's totally the other way around. I actually think Johannesburg represents the future. What I think the world is going to become looks like Johannesburg."
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