Spoiler Alert:  The following review of the movie District 9 contains spoilers.

District 9 is a movie about humanity – a term I use in the loosest sense of the word.  While it may be marketed and described as a sci-fi movie, the movie is, sadly, far too real.

The details are as follows: Aliens arrive on earth in South Africa.  They are ostracized and put into a slum known as District 9.  The movie takes place as the South American government is looking to move the residents of District 9 – which is in the heart of Johannesburg – to District 10, located 200 miles outside of the city.  The action of the movie is at times intense and moving.  The main plot was entertaining but it was the message behind the film that was really amazing.

The film is simply an allegory of the crimes against humanity that far too many cultures have been privy to.  You can make direct correlations to South African Apartheid, but there are allusions to Nazi Germany, the United States government treatment of Native American, and countless other forms of ethnocentrism that have plagued our species since the dawn of time.  The movie wasn’t about Aliens, it was about the humanity – or lack thereof – that exists in the human species.  Each character was a caricature of the people that make these types of behavior possible.

The ending of the movie is a revelation of storytelling.  The main character – Wikas – was stricken with an ailment that was slowly transforming him into a “prawn,” a derogatory name for the Alien creatures.  In an attempt to try to turn himself back into his human form, he helped one of the Aliens, who goes by the name Christopher, who has the knowledge to activate the ship and return the aliens to the home planet.  Wikas and Christopher take on the government – in the form of an organization called Multi-National United – and attempt to reactive the mothership.  Ultimately, they are successful and Christopher reactivates the ship and takes off – with a promise to return in 3 years.  The movie ends with Wikas – fully transformed into a “prawn” – living in District 10 and whether Christopher would return is unknown.

The movie, ultimately, ends with the audience questioning what happens next.  Does Christopher return?  If he does – will it be with an army to destroy earth for their atrocities?  Will it be simply to reclaim his people?  Ultimately, the audience is left simply with the question of, “What would you do?”  And that begins the true beauty of the movie…

For many people, the answer to that question is revenge.  Revenge is a tricky concept though.  It’s a personal thing and yet, so many of our world’s problems stems from the feeling of retaliation.  An eye for an eye is one of the oldest human mantras.  Many of our modern problems in the Middle East stem from the concept of revenge – from the personal loss of family members to the deeper seated feelings due to centuries of persecution.  The movie’s allegory causes you to feel the need for revenge which ultimately conjures up the darkness of the human spirit.  Strip away the movie’s science fiction elements and look at how humans treat each other based on imaginary lines of country, the color of one’s skin, or ideologies and you start to feel sick.  I couldn’t help but ask myself “when does revenge stop?”  The sad thing is that it doesn’t.  Nothing exists in a vacuum.  For some, a day like 9/11 was a day of reckoning – when a group of people were able to seek revenge on the Evil Empire that is the United States of America.  To us here in the US, many cries for revenge occurred because those civilian people who died needed to be avenged.  Wars raged – killing more, creating a circle of violence that we may not ever see the end of.  This is over multiple continents.  If you examine the Palestinian and Isreali coflict – you’ll see a cycle of revenge that may never see an end.  These are the thoughts that the movie inspired as the credits rolled.  It made me feel sick to be human.

Movies like this deserve to stand on their own – to let the questions it inspire stand still.  I doubt there will be a sequel – although many people take the unresolved ending to mean there would be.  I think they’re missing the point.  The point was to have all those thoughts that I had above swarm through your head.  The point was to reflect on your own humanity – including the dark parts of our souls that allow us to stand still while many of the activities that we saw in the movie are actually taking place.  To real people.  Right this second.  The movie isn’t about a plot – it’s about saying something to all of us.  It’s the first truly artistic movie I have seen in a long time.  A movie that speaks volumes without shouting it, without dumbing it down.  It’s a movie with a point – even if the point is to point out the evil that we do to each other.

I apologize for any typos in the above and/or confusing sentences.  It’s hard to really write in detail the way this movie made me feel and the countless thoughts that are running through my head.  At the end of the day, I suggest that you go see the movie.  I don’t think you’ll regret it.