China Entertainment King of Science Fiction

Chapter 440 Alien Refugees

"District 9" is a movie that puts its setting first.

It does not describe why the aliens came or what they experienced, but the background of the entire movie is introduced in the form of a documentary at the beginning.

20 years ago, a huge spaceship no larger than a city landed in the sky above a suburb in South Africa, hovering thousands of meters in the air using a technology that people could not understand.

Human society was very nervous about this, but the alien visitors neither attacked nor had any communication with human society. Soon after, humans took the risk and sent a plane to approach the spacecraft. The scene after opening the hatch shocked the fully armed and protected humans.

They were a group of malnourished alien lifeforms with ugly faces that looked like prawns. The moment humans opened the spacecraft, they were panicked by the light that suddenly shone in.

All the upper layers of the alien prawns seemed to be dead, and all the disgusting prawns were crowded in the cabin like a mob. The living environment was extremely harsh and seemed somewhat aimless.

They don't seem to have come to "invade" the earth, but more like refugees who have escaped from the earth.

On the surface, humans were motivated by "humanitarianism", but in fact they wanted to study alien prawns, especially their spaceships, so they set aside an area under the huge spaceship and moved out the millions of surviving people from the spaceship.

designed alien prawns and housed them below.

This place where the alien prawns are housed is called "Area 9".

At the same time, this temporary shelter became a quarantine area.

Therefore, this high-sounding measure aimed at "improving the living conditions of alien refugees" while considering both humans and shrimps obviously cannot be backed by violence, and it must definitely be solved by violence.

Zhang Yi led the security personnel further into District 9 and found dozens of dark, disgusting alien eggs that had not yet fully hatched in a room.

After twenty years of accumulation, the conflict between humans and shrimps is on the verge of breaking out.

Although the film begins with a straightforward shot that subverts the audience's expectations, turning the usual alien images in science fiction works into unprecedented alien refugees.

And when humans entered the spacecraft and saw a group of dirty, disgusting, ugly, malnourished alien prawns, their original psychological expectations were quickly shattered.

In the camera, Zhang Yi looked like a United Nations bureaucrat and scholar with his eyes. He was familiar with District 9 and the habits and social structure of the alien prawns, and he seemed to have a good understanding of them.

The prawns can trade with the gangsters by selling the supplies and weapons they brought from the spaceship.

Some people realize it, some people don't.

Chief Jia's expression gradually became calm, and the crowd in front of the white curtain and around him fell silent.

Yes, even though the alien prawns are still ugly, the insect-like mouthparts that initially made people tingle have not changed, and the so-called alien eggs are as sticky and ugly as covered with a layer of black crude oil.

Scientists speculate that these weapons can only be used by special individuals among these alien prawns, possibly the upper-level aliens. However, these upper-level aliens all died due to unknown reasons, so these prawns were reduced to a state of confusion.

situation, and became a refugee living on the earth, unable to even leave.

But just now, through some previous foreshadowing about the current situation of District 9 and the conflict between humans and alien prawns, Zhang Yi led the security team into District 9 in a few minutes.

When the aerial shots showed a group of low houses below, surrounded by isolated walls and barbed wire, accompanied by the drum beats of the soundtrack, Director Jia already had some idea of ​​why this film was selected into the main competition and even opened.

Video.

Although the agency that manages alien affairs has long since recovered the alien weapons in District 9, there are still hidden weapons hidden in District 9 and spread through the black market.

Having traveled to major international film festivals all year round, he naturally understands the political correctness of Europe and the United States.

What makes people feel uncomfortable is what humans do.

And this impression is entirely due to the innate human instinct to fear insects, even though Director Jia judged from the beginning of the film that the main theme of the film was a metaphor for apartheid and racial conflict.

The hateful alien prawns have lived in District 9 for twenty years, so although they have their own language, they can also understand human language. "Prawn experts" like Zhang Yi can also understand aliens.

language.

But the alien is an overly ugly prawn insect that gives the audience the first impression of fear and disgust, especially the mouthparts that look a bit like a locust and a bit like a shrimp and crab.

These sci-fi-looking alien weapons cannot be used by humans at all, not even these alien prawns.

Although the camera is still following Zhang Yi, the audience has begun to switch to a natural human perspective and has begun to substitute for the alien prawn, which is still extremely ugly.

The alien refugees look like shrimps, and local residents also call these alien refugees prawns. These prawns usually make a living by digging through garbage and relying on scavenging kitchen waste. They will also make deals with humans, exchanging some cat and dog food to improve their diet.

Although District 9 is relatively isolated from the human world, it is in close contact with humans. There are not only alien refugees in District 9, but also humans, who are local gangs.

Therefore, the management department of the United Nations dealing with extraterrestrial affairs and the local government decided to relocate the "9th District" where the alien refugees live to a place far away from the city and establish the "10th District" to solve the "human shrimp" conflict.

At first, Zhang Yi took the relocation documents and tried to get the alien prawns in a room to sign. These prawns, who did not seem to have high IQs, were willing to accept the cat food Zhang Yi sent them, but they still refused to sign.

This metaphor of the apartheid ghetto combined with the fact that the story in the film takes place in South Africa is not even a metaphor, or in other words, the metaphor is very clear to him.

The perspective has shifted.

In fact, the beginning of the film does have the feel of a science fiction blockbuster. The huge circular spaceship is quite shocking in terms of industrial design and visual effects.

"What a splendid story!"

Zhang Yi was originally a zoologist. He also studied the alien prawns in Area 9 with the same mentality as studying animals and plants. This time, Zhang Yi was undoubtedly excited to follow the security personnel deep into Area 9. He was preparing to publish

A book about an alien prawn, this is a rare opportunity to obtain more first-hand information.

The sound of explosions in the flames crackled.

Even though political correctness is changing with each passing day, the issue of race has always been enduring. It is risky to use the theme of aliens to explore this issue, but it will definitely add points to the film.

The camera follows the explosions with splashes of rocks and the bloody scenes of bloody scenes without fear.

Zhang Yi was so happy that he took a prawn egg and dissected it in front of the cameras following him. He introduced the strangely shaped prawn egg in a serious manner.

These prawns have lived there for twenty years, and often go to the city to do some illegal things. The citizens are becoming more and more dissatisfied, so violent conflicts continue to occur in the 9th District, and they are even violently expelled from the town.

But the effect is really quite good.

"Great shot! The protagonist has changed!"

But he still couldn't replace the ugly alien prawn that made people uncomfortable. He believed that the same was true for other viewers, so he still took the human side as the protagonist. Movies are an art about feelings. If they can't convey intuitive perceptual experiences, they will be miserable.

It won't help to talk about the truth in garish words.

There are signs such as "No entry for non-human beings" or "For human use only" everywhere in the city. They are everywhere in parks, in front of shops, and even on traffic signs on the road.

Section Chief Jia secretly praised in his heart.

Zhang Yi is the representative of the United Nations' "Ninth District" special processing agency. He is responsible for language communication and legal interpretation, which is the soft part of reasoning. If the reason does not work, there will be local police and United Nations security personnel.

Come on hard.

He will undoubtedly create a psychological expectation for the audience.

It was also his identity as "Diaxia Tong" that allowed him to become one of the persons in charge of this "alien refugee relocation operation".

The rest of the security personnel, with a playful and clean-up attitude, took out flamethrowers and destroyed the alien eggs in batches.

The task of relocation was handed over to the United Nations agency responsible for dealing with the "Ninth District" issue, with the local police acting as "auxiliary".

He and his wife, played by Wan Qian, are both staff members of the United Nations' "Region 9" Special Committee. They have been studying aliens in South Africa for a long time. They are considered "alien experts" and they do have in-depth research on alien prawns.

In other words, the protagonist has changed.

It established the unique image of the film.

Zhang Yi yelled "Don't shoot" when the soldiers raised their guns and told them to put them down. When they found the alien eggs, Zhang Yi smiled and pulled out the oxygen pipes and said, "This way, it will die." It seemed.

What kind of prank are you playing?

In 20 years, humans have lost interest in these prawns. They have no relief, no sympathy, and no curiosity. They have become a burden to this society.

It’s not that the audience has developed feelings of hatred towards the alien prawns.

There were also faint sounds of admiration not far away. It seemed that someone had thought of the same thing as him.

But these prawns, with hunched bodies that are taller than normal humans, dodge under the gunfire of security personnel, or resist in vain in an attempt to intimidate humans.

It is indeed a quite novel alien movie.

Zhang Yi and other action team members seemed to be polite to the prawns, but in fact they seemed to be driving away wild animals, and their behavior of holding alien eggs for fun made the audience have feelings for the ugly and uncomfortable alien prawns.

pity.

Chief Jia didn’t know whether the aliens’ images were deliberately designed to be ugly, or whether these black alien eggs were deliberately designed to be disgusting.

There were also sporadic arson incidents in the 9th District, and houses were burned down in patches.

It's because of this contrast that the empathy towards the alien prawns will have an even more shocking effect.

However, after twenty years of reproduction, even though the living environment of the alien prawns is relatively harsh, the total population of "District 9" has expanded to 2 million.

Just like the spring breeze turning into rain, the change of position and perspective was completed silently.

By the time I realized this, the transformation had been completed smoothly. The ugly alien prawn was the protagonist of the film, and humans... seemed to be the villains.

Chief Jia recalled Chen Jingxing’s answer when interviewed by the media on the red carpet: “This is an alternative alien movie.”

Really different.

(End of chapter)