Wikus a metaphor for Jesus??

The main metaphor in the film is so obvious it is interesting to look at other metaphors that don’t quite fit. For instance, I found that some online bloggers see a resemblance to Jesus in the skinny white character Wikus. They argue there is a Messianic narrative tied into the film through Wikus and the main prawn in how they liberate a population (or we are led to assume they will eventually). Wikus is put in a position of power where he is in charge of evicting the prawns and moving them to a new area. After he begins to morph into a prawn and change his way of thinking a Christ figure emerges that is split into two characters: Wikus sacrificial human body and the prawn Christopher Johnson, the soul. So, Wikus’s human body is sacrificed like the story of Jesus on the cross and his soul is Christopher who descends into the sky and is a representation of the resurrection (or at least that’s what I think they are getting at no one goes into much detail). In order for this metaphor to work, at this point in the film, Wikus and Christopher essentially become one character. When Wikus is defeated Christopher ascends into the cross shaped alien mothership, vowing to return in three years to rescue Wikus and turn him back into a human. This is a view held by some online critics of District 9. Some believe that all the self sacrifice that eventually leads to a cross shaped space ship to fly away and free the aliens is a Messianic symbol that is to blunt not to notice.
After reading a few of these suggestions I can’t help but think this metaphor is stretching it a bit too far. There is some convincing evidence that Wikus could be a Jesus metaphor but it becomes cloudy because he only resembles Jesus in one scene. Throughout the entire film he is apart of the oppressive MNU relocation program and he even takes pleasure in alien pain (he finds amusement in the sound of popping alien eggs when they are burning). Only when he decides to sacrifice himself is there any sort of resemblance to Jesus. Even then, in order to make the metaphor work it must be split into two characters, Wikus and the alien Christopher. Also, upon watching the scene where the spacecraft ascends into the mothership, the cross symbolism is pretty weak. I do agree there are some ties to Christ, for instance, when (Christ)opher vows to return in three years to save his people. But this was most likely done so Blomkamp could make a sequel. There are some distant ties but one really has to look deep (and make some stretches) in order to find them, to the point where I feel Blomkamp had no intention in making Wikus a Christ figure.

Blomkamp and South Africa

When discussing his creative vision and where it came from, in a recent interview Blomkamp stated that the apartheid was his, “most powerful influence.” Also stating that "It all had a huge impact on me: the white government and the paramilitary police -- the oppressive, iron-fisted military environment.” What Blomkamp witnessed in his younger years has shaped who he is and how he identifies with the world. As humans we bring value from our experiences and it is quite obvious that because he lived in segregated South Africa he values social equality more than most leading him to make a film about it. But Blomkamp moved to Vancouver when he was 18 where he experienced a totally different world. It is interesting to wonder if Blomkamp had strong concerns for equality while he was in South Africa or if this only occurred from spending a lot of his life in Vancouver and how different of a person he would be if he would have stayed in South Africa. This move totally changed his reality and it changed the framing of the film. If he wouldn’t have moved the film could have kept along the path that the aliens are creatures not worthy of rights or freedom straying from the apartheid metaphor. But because he did spend so many years in a segregated country what he emphasizes in the film becomes quite obvious. He emphasizes the white upper class and their brutality to the aliens because these are things he has witnessed firsthand.

While the film was shot on location a lot of the film was shot using green screens and special effects. But the area that Blomkamp decided to use for the ghetto of the aliens was in one of Soweto’s poorest neighborhoods. As the film crew began shooting they noticed smoke clouds and choppers flying overhead. South African groups began to lynch and burn other African groups, there seemed to be fighting between Zimbabwean refugees and the South Africans. The films basic themes were still happening all around them, Blomkamp noted that they were witnessing, “black on black xenophobia.” Because of these events he was making a film not only about the past apartheid but about present South Africa as well. Events like these definitely shaped what went into the film. At the beginning of the film there is a scene where smoke is flying up into the sky from a number of different locations and choppers are flying overhead. He most likely included this as a reference to the present struggles in South Africa and because he experienced it firsthand.

Hierarchy

As humans we live in a hierarchical society where everything is ranked. Many of our decisions are made because of how we rank certain items. For instance, where we prefer to shop for food or personal products is often due to a personal ranking that we have made and placed a certain store or product in. When applied to humans hierarchy often creates a system of oppression that separates people into different classes. The job one works and the money they make is often a large factor that determines which class one will belong to in a society. The United States as well as most other parts of the world have a hierarchy which in the past was due to racial segregation. In the film District 9 it is quite obvious what the hierarchical structure is. At the top are the white upper class and governmental workers while at the very bottom are the aliens. Although the aliens are physically more powerful they are deemed as dumb/poor and therefore gain no respect and are expected to oblige by the rules of the wealthy upper class and humans in general. This led to the aliens becoming a “scapegoat” for the humans and any problems that they were having.

When dealing with hierarchy Kenneth Burk noticed two common themes that occurred: action and motion. Motion is essentially the non-symbolic features of the world that helps structure our way of life while action involves the symbolic capacities of people. In the film, the aliens themselves would be considered motion meaning the aliens alone are non-symbolic but when different species become categorized it turns into action. So when the aliens become categorized as aliens or “prawns” and become a separate group this is when hierarchical action begins to occur. It essentially occurs when the human society begins to use ultimate terms in their rhetoric when describing the aliens. It is obvious that the humans believe their race and culture is superior to the aliens and this can be seen through a number of different actions like the signs that prohibit aliens from entering certain human dominated areas. These actions by the humans are what begins to structure a hierarchy of oppression where one specie or race is favored over the other because of who is in power and the hegemonic ideas that flood the media.