District 9

I like this film a lot. I first saw it, when it was released about three years ago, during a twenty-eight hour flight from Heathrow to Auckland. My mind was somewhat fuzzy from sleep deprivation. I thought then it was funny, that the alien characters and other CGI parts were done very well but that there was something a bit disconcerting about the complete dorkishness of the protagonist. When I watched it again last night I twigged that this may be integral to the film's dramatic realisation.

Sharlto Copley as Wikus van der Merwe

This film may not have broken the mould by viewing “us” as being in the wrong and by siding with the underdogs. Indeed, this is a familiar trope but only recently have the underdogs been aliens. It did, however, precede Avatar, in which aliens are entirely the good guys and humans are just rapacious invaders.

The protagonist of District 9, Wikus van der Merwe, is an ingenue although one with whom it is difficult, at first, to empathise. The bureaucratic MNU operative whose authority, conferred by his promotion to lead the team charged with evicting the aliens from District 9, quickly leaks away when he attempts to joke with the “cowboy” military force deployed to protect the officials giving notice of eviction to the aliens.

There are some slapstick moments in the film: when Wikus accidentally squirts himself with the mysterious alien liquid; when he gets home and tells his wife he may have shit his pants – in a room which is darkened to conceal his friends who are waiting to surprise him at his birthday party; when he pukes over his birthday cake.

But from being a fool at whom we sneer he becomes a tragic hero.

Wikus suffers rejection by, and isolation from, his wife Tania whom he clearly loves, and he is ostracised by human society due to his Kafkaesque metamorphosis into a “prawn”. The metamorphosis is caused by contact with the alien liquid but his 'alienation' is enhanced by the misinformation spread by MNU that this affliction came about from perverse sex with the aliens.

He gains compassion for the aliens via his own mistreatment at the hands of humans. Perhaps the major turning point for this character is when he realizes that his employers, rather than having his best interests at heart are, in fact, quite interested in removing his heart.

Wikus' physical transformation is grasped by MNU as a military opportunity as only aliens can operate the alien bio-weaponry but he is treated callously by them to the point where they attempt surgical removal of his heart with complete disregard for any feelings he may have about this.

As Wikus is about to be carved up by MNU surgeons he makes a violent escape and eventually makes his way back to District 9 to hide out. When an alien, Christopher, tells him that the liquid which has caused his metamorphosis could also be used to reverse the process he acquires alien weaponry and attacks the MNU facility to retrieve the flask of liquid.

In the ensuing fighting he initially abandons Christopher, escaping from Koobus, the psychotic soldier, but then returns to help the alien. He feels betrayed by Christopher later when the alien says he cannot 'fix' him immediately because he needs all of the liquid to fuel his spacecraft to travel quickly to his home planet and return with help to rescue his people.

Ultimately though, I believe Wikus accepts his fate and is pleased that Christopher has escaped.

The final poignant image is of him as a fully transformed alien sitting alone fashioning a rose from scrap metal like one that he has already left anonymously on his wife's doorstep.