District 9 - A story of alien rights

The aliens came 28 years ago and landed in Cape Town. Humanity kept waiting either for their wrath or for them to bring a new order of technological and social advance. Neither of these came.

The aliens, refugees from another world, were initially welcomed and began to mix up with the locals. Then problem arose. Hospitality did worn out over crime and culture shock. Multi-National United (MNU), a private entity, became the main contractor for handling the alien situation. MNU main purpose is to exploit the aliens’ technology and especially that related to their advanced weaponry. Unfortunately all attempts are unsuccessful. The alien wonders are out of human reach simply because they need alien DNA in order to function. Because of MNU real interest, aliens' welfare is completely obliterated. They are treated as a racial inferiority and segregated from the earth population mostly inside Distric 9, the township which gives the name to the movie.
District 9 is a reminiscence of the real District 6 in Cape Town, a symbol of the south-african apartheid politics of the ‘70s. This is also the key to reading the movie. Aliens are called non-humanslike the black people were once called non-white. A lot of the town areas as well as services are prohibited to the aliens who are kept living in poor conditions.

The promotion of the film heavily relies on viral marketing. The producers made up several web sites. The official web site is maintained by MNU and the visitor sees different content depending on whether they enter as human or non-human. Human content has a relaxing and reassuring tone, the visitor can check the town map which depicts mostly accessible areas and consult career opportunities.
The non-human web sites has a harsh tone, the town map shows nearly all restricted areas and what is offered is labor. The non-human web content is also primarily written (and spoken) in alien language with the English translation always available. Apartheid-like posters are spread all around the world, sometimes restricting restrooms or pubs to humans-only visitors, some other times warning that a bus or a cab stops only for human customers. In all the advertisement campaign a toll free number (1-866-666-6001) is always present and connects the caller to MNU automated speaker which provides some options including report non-human activity.

There’s also a blog called MNU spreads lies, run by an alien named Christopher. He’s a resistance type and basically reports on how’s living under inhuman (inalien ;) conditions inside the Distric 9 slums and crushed by MNU appalling regulations. Christopher reports that all the members of their species are forced to be assigned with an English name, that they have no basic work rights, that their spawn are registered and tracked and so on. He also provides a counter part of the highly censored MNU video in which he shows his face that was pixelated and pronounces the words “we only want to go home”.
This strong viral campaign is comparable and maybe superior to those notorious of The Blair Witch Project and, lately, Cloverfild. I just hope this effort is not done to reach the same aim of the former two: to arise a storming buzz and then deceive the audience (or most of it). You can call those two movies a huge marketing and economic success, an blazing experiment, but the reality is that their content was in no way worth the expectations generated by the viral advertisement and, shortly, of those of any blockbuster which they pretended to be.

My expectations about this film are big so I hope it will maintain the promises and be a damn stunning blockbuster, full of tons of special effect and with a soul!
District 9 is produced by Peter Jackson and directed by Neill Blomkamp. It originates from an independent short film, also from the same director, called “Alive in Joburg” which investigates the apartheid theme introducing the alien factor.
The film is due to release on August 28 in the United States and later on worldwide.
Should you be interested in take a deeper look in the subjects related to this movie you can check this article by JK Flower
Below some images related to the movie and the viral sites plus a trailer of District 9.




Wanted Christopher Notice (Printable PDF)
Alien Target Poster (Printable PDF)






All the above pictures and the video are copyright of either QED International or Sony Pictures under TriStar Pictures (not completely sure) and here reproduced under the terms of the Fair Use.