District 9 is a 2009 science fiction film directed by Neill Blomkamp, written by Blomkamp and Terri Tatchell, and produced by Peter Jackson. The film stars Sharlto Copley, Jason Cope, and Robert Hobbs. Copley plays the role of Wikus van de Merwe, a South African bureaucrat assigned to relocate a race of extraterrestrial creatures, derogatorily referred to as “prawns”, from a refugee camp in Johannesburg to a new one outside the city.

The story, adapted from Alive in Joburg, a 2005 short film directed by Blomkamp and produced by Copley, deals with the issues of xenophobia and social segregation. The title and premise of District 9 were inspired by events that took place in District Six, Cape Town during the apartheid era. The film was produced for $30 million and shot on location in Chiawelo, Soweto, presenting fictional interviews, news footage, and video from surveillance cameras in a part mock documentary style. A viral marketing campaign began in 2008 at the San Diego Comic-Con, and the theatrical trailer appeared in July 2009. District 9 opened to critical acclaim on August 14, 2009 in North America by TriStar Pictures, and earned $37 million on its opening weekend.

Themes

Forced evictions

Like Alive in Joburg, the short film on which the feature film is based, the setting of District 9 is inspired by historical events that took place in South Africa during the apartheid era, with the film’s title particularly referencing District Six. District Six, an inner-city residential area in Cape Town, was declared a “whites only” area by the government in 1966, with 60,000 people forcibly removed and relocated to Cape Flats, 25 km (15 mi) away. The film also refers to contemporary evictions and forced removals to new suburban ghettos in post-apartheid South Africa and the resistance of residents.This includes the high profile attempted forced removal of Joe Slovo Informal Settlement in Cape Town to Temporary Relocation Areas in Delft, the attempted evictions of Abahlali baseMjondolo and evictions in the shack settlement, Chiawelo, where the film was actually shot. The temporary relocation area dubbed Blikkiesdorp has also been compared with the District 9 camp earning a front page spread in the Daily Voice.

Xenophobia

Themes of racism and xenophobia are put forward by the movie in the form of speciesism applied to the aliens. This is most immediately evidenced by the derogatory use of the word “prawn” to describe the aliens, the term being a reference to the Parktown prawn, a king cricket species considered a plague in South Africa. However, Copley said that this was not the main focus in the work, and that one could even miss it, but it would still work at a subconscious level. Furthermore the reference made by the scientists in MNU to Van De Merwe as a ‘specimen’ reinforces the idea that he was no longer within their ethical duty to protect, and this also shows their prejudice against the aliens.

Corporations and privatization

An underlying theme in District 9 is state reliance on multinational corporations as a type of privatized government and military, a reference to the United States’ use of Blackwater and KBR/Halliburton as private military contractors. As MNU represents the kind of corporation which partners with governments, the negative portrayal of MNU in the film can be seen as a statement about the dangers of governments outsourcing their militaries and bureaucracies to private contractors.

Production

Development

Producer Peter Jackson planned to produce a film adaptation based on the Halo video game franchise with first-time director Neill Blomkamp. Due to lack of financing, the Halo adaptation was placed on hold. Jackson and Blomkamp discussed pursuing alternative projects and eventually chose to produce and direct District 9, respectively. Blomkamp had previously directed commercials and short films, but District 9 was his first feature film. The director co-wrote the script with Terri Tatchell and chose to film in South Africa, where he was born. In District 9, Tatchell and Blomkamp emulated the world explored in his short film “Alive in Joburg”, choosing characters, moments, and concepts that they found interesting, and fleshing out these elements for the feature film.

QED International fully financed the production of the independent film, underwriting the negative cost prior to American Film Market (AFM) 2007. At AFM 2007, QED entered into a distribution deal with Sony Pictures under TriStar Pictures for North America, all other English-language territories, Korea, Italy, Russia and Portugal.

Filming

The film was shot on location in Chiawelo, Soweto during a time of violent unrest in Alexandra, Gauteng and other South African townships involving clashes between native South Africans and Africans born in other countries. The location that portrays District 9 in itself was in fact a real impoverished neighbourhood from which people were being forcibly relocated to government-subsidised housing.

Blomkamp said no one film influenced District 9 but cited the 1980s “hardcore, sci-fi/action” films such as Alien, Aliens, The Terminator, Terminator 2: Judgement Day, Predator, and RoboCop as subconscious influences. The director said, “I don’t know whether the film has that feeling or not for the audience, but I wanted it to have that harsh 1980s kind of vibe — I didn’t want it to feel glossy and slick.”

Because of the amount of hand-held shooting required for the film, the producers and crew decided to shoot using the digital Red One camera. Cinematographer Trent Opaloch used nine digital Red Ones owned by Peter Jackson for primary filming, as well as several Sony EX1 and EX3s.

Visual effects

The aliens in District 9 were designed by Weta Workshop, and the design was executed by Image Engine. Blomkamp established criteria for the design of the aliens; he wanted the species to be insectile but also bipedal. The director wanted the audience to relate to the aliens and said of the restriction on the creature design, “Unfortunately, they had to be human-esque because our psychology doesn’t allow us to really empathize with something unless it has a face and an anthropomorphic shape. Like if you see something that’s four-legged, you think it’s a dog; that’s just how we’re wired… If you make a film about an alien force, which is the oppressor or aggressor, and you don’t want to empathize with them, you can go to town. So creatively that’s what I wanted to do but story-wise, I just couldn’t.” Blomkamp originally sought to have Weta Digital design the creatures, but the company was busy with effects for Avatar. The director then decided to choose a Vancouver-based effects company because he anticipated to make films there in the future and because British Columbia offered a tax credit. Blomkamp met with Image Engine and considered them “a bit of a gamble” since the company had not pursued a project as large as a feature film.

Weta Digital instead designed the mothership and the drop ship, while the exo-suit and the little pets were designed by The Embassy Visual Effects. Zoic Studios performed overflow 2D work. On-set live special effects were created by MXFX.

Music

The music for District 9 was scored by Canadian composer Clinton Shorter, who spent three weeks preparing for the film. Director Neill Blomkamp wanted a “raw and dark” score, but one that maintained its African roots. This was a challenge for Shorter, who found much of the African music he worked with to be optimistic and joyful. Unable to get the African drums to sound dark and heavy, Shorter used taiko and artificial drums for the desired effects, with the core African elements of the score conveyed in the vocals and smaller percussion. Both the score and soundtrack feature music and vocals from Kwaito artists.