MEMBER BLOG TAG: south africa
| Tuesday, August 25, 2009 1:55PM | | | | The Symbols of District 9 | Tags: district 9, blomkamp, peter jackson, south africa, district six, human rights, mnu, sharlto copley
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District 9
Directed by Neill Blomkamp
Written by Neill Blomkamp and Terri Tatchell
Produced by Peter Jackson
Starring Sharlto Copley
Key Creatives, 2009. 112 minutes.
District 9 has taken the American box office by storm. The film depicts the arrival of aliens in the unlikely locale of Johannesburg, South Africa. Establishing contact with alien life forms in the movies is never as simple as we'd like it to be.
But this picture moves beyond a B sci-fi flick with some penetrating social commentary. At times satirical and other times allegorical, the story skillfully interweaves the history and culture of South Africa with mecha-robots and spaceships.
The vagaries of the film industry have resulted in the film being released in... | | | | | | | Monday, May 5, 2008 11:06AM | | | | Everything's on the Table | Tags: Rian Malan, Alexandra Fuller, South Africa, Zimbabwe
| | | | There was nothing neutral about watching fellow white southern Africans – one who lives in the U.S. and one who lives in South Africa – talk about their powerful, groundbreaking memoirs (Alexandra Fuller’s Don’t Let’s Go to the Dogs Tonight, Scribbling the Cat and Rian Malan’s My Traitor’s Heart). It was a meal where everything was served up – loathing, longing, “ordinary murder” (Malan’s phrase), betrayal, complicity, family dysfunction southern African-style, marinated in a mix of racism and booze. On the subject of whether or not their families had read their books, Fuller responded first with, “My mother organized a one-woman boycott of my book.” After she suggested to her father that he listen to it on tape, “I can’t listen to any bloody tapes.... | | | | | |
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