District+9

District 9.

Marxist Film Theory: District 9 is heavily inspired by South Africa’s past apartheid system so it’s no surprise that the film is commenting on societies ills and woes. Aliens or “Prawns” are being repressed-on a smaller extent-by blacks and-by a much larger extent- whites. This power play is heavily emphasized in the color schemes of props, with the color white consistently being displayed as the “superior” color. The brutal and repressive government has a love for the color white, as a lot of their equipment, buildings, guns, even their government flag is painted in that color! These nice, clean white things all serve a visual contrast to poverty, as all things related to poverty, or lower class are grimy and dark in color. This color pattern becomes pretty clear in the first few scenes when the powerful and gleaming white armored vehicles come into the disgusting grimy apartheid camps. The cinematography is strongly reminiscent of that of a documentary and lends toward a strong gritty realism, camerawork reserved only for sections of the film devoted to the aliens and blacks living in poverty. This style of camerawork makes sense though considering that documentaries tend to follow subjects that have less than ideal lives. The camera movements shake and bob around in the same way a cameraman covering the Taliban would. These shakycam sections serve a distinct contrast to the quite literally more stable subjects behind the camera. When the main character is wandering around the apartheid camps in his fake documentary, camera movements are unpredictable and crude, but when the film gets to his life away from apartheid, the camera is steady and more cinematic; this becomes almost a visual metaphor to the two lifestyles the people that inhabit these two worlds lead.

Cultural Studies The editing of the film gives it a even stronger reflection of the Afrikaans culture of South Africa than the other elements have already shown. By interlacing interviews and news footage together into the film, District 9 makes the film feel even more realistic and relevant despite the movie being about aliens. Corruption, crime, racial segregation, these are all problems that South Africans knowingly face in reality. Considering that the director is a South African, it’s not surprising he would try to make modern African societal issues more relevant by showing it through the use of interviews and news footage. District 9 is blurring what one would see at home on T.V in reality and what one would see in a cinema. We as an audience all know that Africa faces innumerable problems (I mean look at all the charities!), so despite the fact this film’s audience may not directly experience Africa’s problems personally on a day to day basis, this mockumentary style of editing makes District 9 feel like real documentary program one would have watched at home; that would explain why all scenes have no special lighting involved and appear to be high key lighting or practical lighting. To me this kind of documentary feel is an effective way to reach its audience regardless of age, sexual identity or income etc… Forced removal of poorer citizens and relocation-prawns in this case- is something many developing cultures in the world can relate to. If you replace “prawn” with Asian, Eastern European or Native American, the themes and story in this movie would still be highly relevant.

Feminist Theory As usual, the main woman character in the film serves as a plot device and nothing more. When the main character is absent, the woman of the film can only cry, and as accordingly is depicted as pretty fragile and delicate. Her depiction in the film is accomplished by doing the opposite of what the film techniques go into most of the gritty movie. Lighting and mis en scene combine to form a high key light scene that is comprised of colorful light colors. She wears colors that are light but somewhat colorful in addition to appearing in scenes where the room is white and filled with light colors. She is also shot much more delicately than most of the male protagonist’s scenes, there is no hurried, shaky and unpredictable camera work when she is on screen.