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It was a beautiful spring day so I took a long walk along the C&O Canal.
Most of the walk was shaded and there was a cool sweet breeze that mingled with the sound of the Potomac River rushing by to make it an ideal afternoon for a hike. Nice ...
"THROW ANOTHER PRAWN ON THE BARBIE.."
I'd just been reading the August 30th free weekly magazine "City" and was about to toss it into the Recycle Bin when I noticed that the issue contained a review of "District 9" and, a few pages earlier, a picture of....a prawn!
That's Madeline Swain's review, by the way, and she liked the film too!
Here's my review:
DISTRICT 9
Feature Film
Directed by Neill Blonkamp
Screenplay by Neill Blonkamp and Terri Tatchell
2009
112 minutes
New Zealand/South Africa
Opening with its tongue firmly in alternate history cheek the feisty Science Fictional “District 9” postulates that twenty eight years ago a vast alien starship took up station above Johannesburg, South Africa. Years later, the million strong number of insectoid extraterrestrials discovered locked aboard, live slummed together in ghetto conditions in the shadow of the massive but inert vessel, festering hopelessly under the essentially thuggish guard of mercenary contractor Multinational United and the Nigerian gangs who’ve infiltrated “District 9”. By the way, old S.F airlock farts like myself will tell you that the big city-hovering alien spaceship goes back in the genre well before “Independence Day” and “V” to Arthur C. Clarke’s novel “Childhood’s End”, and beyond. (Good on me!)
Enter midlevel functionary Wikus van der Merwe, an M.N.U field officer who’s been given the the thankless job of overseeing the relocation of the aliens to a new camp away from the city. It’s a public relations, inhuman rights and logistical nightmare where the dichotomy of attitudes to long term refugee camps is constantly underlined by polite, recorded admonishments to the mercs that “A smile is cheaper than a bullet”, even as they lock and load their automatic weapons. Wikus gamely tries to hyperactively muscle up to the task, though it’s clear he’s such a well machined cog in the M.N.U apparatus that he doesn’t see anything wrong with calling the aliens “The Prawn” (actually a reference to a type of large South African cricket ironically dubbed ‘Parktown Prawns’) as he sets about cheerfully evicting them from their shanty town shacks ‘for their own good.” The operation progressively goes pear shaped in the full glare of the media spotlight that’s being shone upon him by an embedded documentary crew. It’s not until he stumbles across a dangerous alien artefact that the hapless Wikus realises just how toxic the poisoned chalice he’s been handed really is. Before he has time to shout “Be afraid, be very afraid...” Wikus experiences a life changing event which will have implications for all man, and indeed alien, kind.
I had the story arc sussed quite early in the piece (well, y’know!) but the
ambiguous relationship between Wikus and the aliens literally evolves constantly as Wikus gets more than a taste of humanity’s own medicine. South Africa’s history carries with it the shabby baggage of racial discrimination and segregation and Blonkamp’s confronting, relentlessly paced movie reflects that back at us in the distorting mirror of the humans’ complex interaction with the stranded aliens. Improvising his way through the dialogue actor Sharlto Copley delivers an energetically nervous performance as Wikus, in a nicely judged tragicomic turn that has an unusually unsympathetic ugly side. The bureaucrat’s “Road To Damascus” conversion doesn’t come easily ! Copley is also Neill Blomkamp’s business partner and a director/writer and producer of genre short films in his own right.
The aliens are also depicted with inflected flair, with the story avoiding the temptation to make them out as being all cut from the same mould. They’re both ‘good’ and ‘bad’ with their characters understandably influenced by their terrible circumstances, on top of the fact that they’re...well...aliens! It’s no longer hard to think of Computer Generated characters as giving performances and the illusion of the main alien character, unceremoniously dubbed “Christopher”, is so evocatively sustained that I want to shake his, er mandible, as he goes to collect his Academy Award.
A professional animator since age sixteen, this is Neill Blomkamp’s impressive debut feature, but his short films (including one upon which “District 9” was based) and advertisements clearly demonstrate his adeptness at blending digital effects with brightly lit real world environments. His special effects laden C.V includes genre shows like “Stargate SG-1”, “Dark Angel”, “Smallville” and the Citroen C4 “Car that transforms into a dancing robot” commercial. He’s also created some very neat shorts for the “Halo” game, and would’ve helmed the movie adaptation. You can see why producer Peter Jackson tapped him for this project when that fell through.
On the subject of mecha, “District 9” includes some terrific power armoured suit action that made me weep oily lubricant tears all over again for the missed opportunity of the loathsome “Starship Troopers” film. Indeed, the tech wouldn’t look out of place in the cutting edge armoured combat franchise, “Iron Man”. (Well, okay, Tony Stark would kick the D9 mech’s metal arse, but that’s a given!)
The pseudo documentary approach easily compensates for any wobbly C.G.I as well as adding to the realistic grittily textured look. Yes, there’s a tonne of deliberately induced camera shake but I minded it not. (I put this down to my superior eye/brain co-ordination and superb sense of catlike balance. So waddup with you?)
The film’s relatively low budget (U.S $30 million!) surely has “Transformers” filmmakers grinding their gears and gnashing their metal teeth with envy! Strategic use of no name actors, reliance upon off- the-shelf F.X technology and a low key but effective viral marketing campaign helped keep costs down.
Once again, everything good I know I learnt from Science Fiction. Until I saw “District 9” it never occurred to me that I, of all people, had acquired a reflexive racist attitude towards the Afrikaans accent. My ear reacted to it as the language of apartheid. Now that “District 9” has made me aware of that I’ll do my best to curb that reflex!
“District 9” is a first rate vigourously executed, satirical Science Fiction movie that pushes further the xenophobic envelope previously marked “Not wanted at this address” by shows like “Alien Nation”, “Doctor Who” and “Star Trek”.
Though for some wicked reason known only to myself I did leave the cinema singing “Prawn Free....”
Podcast here:
Lock 21 on the C&O Canal is known as Swains lock. The Swain family has lived and worked at Lockhouse 21 since the early 1900s until about 3 years ago. Swain family members began working on the original construction of the canal and also worked as boatmen and lock tenders, operating Swain’s Lock at mile 16.6.
Hand held bracketed shots for this HDR
Swain's Lock is named after the family the used to reside at the location and tend the lock when it was in operation.
"Swain family members began working on the original construction of the canal and also worked as boatmen and lock tenders, operating Swain’s Lock at mile 16.6. The Swains lived at the lockhouse during the floods of 1889; 1936, when bridges were destroyed at Harpers Ferry and Shepherdstown; as well as in 1942 and 1972. Jesse Swain was the lock tender when the canal closed down in 1924."
I turned up around 4pm at Karl Marx's grave for Copey's busking tour appearance. Met a few people, left soon after 5pm (with no sign of Cope) to find ourselves locked in to the cemetery. Luckily someone was around to let us out. We were about to disperse when we got word from a driver in Cope's mini convoy that they were still coming. We waited an hour in the increasingly biting cold, getting strange looks, and eventually Cope & band marched down Swain's Lane, with Black Sheep placards and Sqwubbsy. As soon as they started the first of 3 songs, the heavens opened and we got hail, thunder & lightning. Rarrrrrr!!! The band stormed through a new track, then 'Come The Revolution' (for Karl, whose grave we we now barred from), and 'All the Blowing-Themselves-Up Motherfuckers'. Then we had a minute's silence in what was now sleaty snow in memory of Marx.
On the dark moon in the Season of the Dead, at the Beginning of the End of Capitalism, it was a righteous and truly bracing time and place to be.
(A few bored Highgate kids in the background who didn't know Cope. They seemed bemused but kind of psyched by stumbling upon such oddness.)
Taken just off the C&O Canal at lock #21, near River Road. Notice the slender feminine build of the smaller tree wrapping its roots around its more muscular counterpart. This is nearly a 4 second exposure, but the squirrel on the tree remained still.
Another great place to curl up with a book or just enjoy a Spring day. But bring the mosquito spray.
A runner stretches on the towpath by Swain's Lock (Lock 21) on the Chesapeake & Ohio Canal. Montgomery County, Maryland, USA.
This fox was sitting near the edge of the canal near Swain's Lock, and sat quietly while I took several pictures.
Canada goose (Branta canadensis) near Swain's Lock on the Chesapeake & Ohio Canal in Montgomery County, Maryland, USA.
Just above Swain's Lock on the C&O Canal, Montgomery County, Maryland. She was so intent on attacking a fallen tree trunk right by the towpath that she let me come within 8 feet of her. We know it's a female because the red crown on the male is more extensive and the female lacks the red stripe on the lower face.
Hi all,
A beautiful night. Will be staying at Swain's Lock campsite right on
the Potomac at mile 16.6 on the C&O trail if anyone needs me.
Bike is all ready and packed, pic enclosed.
Will be on my mobile the whole way at 202-538-0059.
See you tomorrow!
Sent via iPhone