The Official Movie Thread

I'm about half way through it, you finally reminded me to watch it.

Fucking loving it.
Some of the best delivery of lines I've seen in a long while.

"Thing about civilians, they've never been to war. Once you've been there you never want to go again unless you absolutely have to... like France"
 
Righteous Kill was great. the story is engaging but not spectacular though the real treat is watching 2 legends together and their very natural character acting.
 
Am I the only one who was disappointed with District 9? I thought it was far too blunt for its own good. Yes, Peter, the movie is an allegory for racism/apartheid South Africa, we get it. The movie is even set in South Africa for Christ's sake, as if they felt it was really necessary to completely eliminate any possible doubt that yes, this movie is definitely a social commentary. Are people really so dumb they need it spelled out for them again and again?

The aliens bothered me, too, because of how IDENTICAL they were to humans. Honestly, they have exact human emotions, human family structures (even though it's implied that they are a hive mind), and just about every non-physical human characteristic. I rolled my eyes when the journalist mentioned 'interspecies prostitution'. Suspension of disbelief is one thing, but come on. I know this is beside the point (what was the point again? Apparently I need reminding because it's been five minutes since they last mentioned it.), but it still destroys the sense of realism the director was aiming for.

I could go on, but I'll stop here.
 
I'm glad you're stopping.


Jokes aside, inter-species "relations" is a hugely common thing, even amongst humans. As a side note, apartheid as a theme - I felt - took a back seat when viewing the film as a documentation... not of the prawn species and their reflections on society, but as a mirror showing the most basic and debauched side of human greed.

I also disagree about the aliens being identical to humans; just because I could empathize with Christopher, his son, or some of the others doesn't mean they had any clone-stamped traits to any/all of the humans in the film. The perfect example of this are the character opposites of Christopher and Wikis; the entirety of Wikis' actions could be viewed as what was in his best interests, whereas Christopher, even when getting the shit end of the stick, makes promises that you as the viewer know -down to the very core of the character - that he will keep.
 
It was only about apartheid themes for like the first 40 minutes or something, in which it was quite obvious...then it became a character study where I didn't know who I actually should feel compassion for. It was awesome.
 
The movie did take a turn towards more character-based elements, but even then I felt it hard to feel much emotion for the characters. Wikus starts out with a compassionless, almost sadistic view towards the prawns (doing things like laughing at the sound of the prawn nest being exterminated), and then he refuses to kill one of them when they're testing the weapon? Kind of a non sequitur. I also found him pretty annoying in general. My dislike for Christopher stemmed from his overly-human characteristics (such as his wide array of human emotions) and the fact that he moved the story towards the cliched 'I have to save my people' angle. Really lame.
 
optionthree said:
The movie did take a turn towards more character-based elements, but even then I felt it hard to feel much emotion for the characters. Wikus starts out with a compassionless, almost sadistic view towards the prawns (doing things like laughing at the sound of the prawn nest being exterminated), and then he refuses to kill one of them when they're testing the weapon? Kind of a non sequitur. I also found him pretty annoying in general. My dislike for Christopher stemmed from his overly-human characteristics (such as his wide array of human emotions) and the fact that he moved the story towards the cliched 'I have to save my people' angle. Really lame.
Click to expand...


Spoilers be ahead.



I found that (as the example you mentioned: nest extermination) was a great character device in that it shows just how well received the prawns are to the general public; I mean, Wikis is put in charge of moving this entirely sentient species to a new location not because it would be better for them, but to get them out of the human populations damn hair.
----------------------
The fact that Wikis refuses to kill the prawn, to me, is not as "damned from the source" as you may think it is. His refusal is due to the extreme experimentation that he is going through, and although he didn't view those egg sacs as anything qualitatively sentient, he certainly was able to recognize the fact that he was taking an adult/mature life - but what also takes precedence in that situation is that he is not acting as a man, but as a test subject.
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This is where we definitely deviate on Wikis/Christopher as characters though. Wikis to me is about as compassionate as Longshanks from Braveheart, though without any of the tact, guile and... well, brains (i.e. he is a moron). Wikis does nothing through the movie that does not serve in his best interest (e.g. running away from Christopher when he acquires the mech suit), in fact he only gains the lead management position due to his wife's father. Christopher on the other hand, was completely self sufficient as a character - all the things that went wrong in the movie was because of the humans and because of Wikis. Hell, he planned on saving his people since they were stranded (humans wouldn't let them leave). Had not anyone intervened, he would have never lost the black liquid, he would have a hell of a lot less dead prawns on his conscious, and he would have gotten to the mothership to take off to where he needs too. Christopher's story has always been about helping his people.


I hated Wikis as a character; however, I am of the firm belief that you are supposed to hate him, he represents every fallacious bullshitted wanker to walk the planet. Not only can he easily showcase his ability to be sincere and love, he can be bestial and filled with ill will. He is bigotry.
 
V.V.V.V.V. said:
How is that a cliche? Even if it is, how is it necessarily bad? I think you're just creating reasons to dislike it, but whatever.
Click to expand...

You can expand people to 'people/friends/child/family member', etc. It's been used so many times that I didn't expect to see it in a movie that got such universal praise. I guess from reading all the hype I was expecting something spectacular, aside from the ending we did get.

I should clarify that I thought the film started fairly strong, creating a good sense of surreality with disturbing events like Wikus' hand transforming into the prawn version, but that the film sort of fell apart from there.
 
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