Popcorn Lobotomy

Is there anything WRONG with a McDonalds hamburger?

1. It tastes ok.
2. Comes in a pretty package
3. Is pleasing to the senses

If you asked a fourteen year old kid he’d probably answer through a mouth of nuggets that there was nothing wrong with it – McDonald’s burgers fucking rock!

But do they? If you peeled back the sugary bun, took away the shavings of lettuce and fatty sauce – and let’s not forget the pickle – you’re left with the meat of the product. And when all the fluff is gone… it’s a pretty sad looking piece of meat.

Yeah, but it's got the sugary bun, and the tasty sauce… and the pickle! What about that stuff?

I admit it, when you first bite into a Big Mac or a Chicken burger or even the humble Cheeseburger – things aren’t that bad.

But half an hour later… you’re left wanting more.

And that’s exactly how I felt with District 9.

I really, really, really wanted this movie to rock. If you’ve seen Neill Blomkamp’s short movie Alive in Jo-Berg you’ll sympathise with me when I say I had high expectations. It’s a great premise – instead of First Contact with shiny, celestial beings with oversize heads and penchants for organ music, we get 20 years after this. The aliens are more like giant cockroaches and are stranded on earth, forced to live in ghettos by our goverment, while we figure out what to do with them. They resort to crime to survive - selling their own weapons and tech for food - particularly catfood (mm-mm!) and are generally not being treated very nicely. The parallels with Apartheid are obvious and it was this angle of something different, something challenging - as well as the film being shot in a semi-documentary style manner - that had me really me salivating.

The movie starts off well – it's gritty and edgy and has an energy and inevitability to it that was engaging. The government is trying to move the million odd aliens out of the District 9 ghetto into a large concentration type facility 100 miles out of the city. A team of social workers from ‘Alien Affairs’ is sent in to evict them led by Wikus Van De Merwe - a dick of the highest order. Tensions are high, the aliens are unpredictable, desperate and you just know all shit is going to (or at least should) break loose. And it kind of does… but not in the way I was expecting.

Anyway, not too long into the story the plight of the Alien population takes a back step to the story of Wikus, who after inadvertently spraying himself with some toxic alien goop starts to change into an Alien.

Yeah, I’ll just let that one sink in.

…

He changes into an alien. Or at least his arm does.

Anyway, this is great news to the government because for years they’ve been trying to get the alien weapons to work. The weapons recognize Alien DNA so are inoperable by humans. But now that poor old Wikus is half alien, once he gets his half alien paws/claws/pincers on them, they fire up and do all sorts of damage. They test him and beat him and I think even spit on him… anyway, he’s not too happy suddenly on the receiving end of the stick he was brandishing only days before.

From here Wikus flees back into District 9 where he teams up with Chistopher Johnson, an alien, who turns out to be the captain or ship engineer or someone important. Christopher needs the goo that Wikus sprayed himself with to power the mothership that hovers above the city and so he and Wikus work together to steal back the goo, powerup the mothership and beam back to Christopher’s home planet.

That’s obviously the short version, but...

But what!? Come on man, what about the fucking kick ass alien weaponry splatterfest?