Derrick
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- Joined
- Nov 22, 2010
- Messages
- 5,085
- Reaction score
- 5
I had the privilege to go to the South African premiere of the movie District 9 by South African born Canadian writer and director Neill Blomkamp. The function was held at The Zone in Rosebank with an after party at the Rosebank Hotel. This was the biggest premiere I have ever seen in South Africa.
Anybody who is anybody in the local film and television industry was there with all the cinemas at The Zone’s commercial movie house used for the screening. The red carpet was long, the stars were out and the buzz was electric. It honestly was! Camera crews were running up and down the very long red carpet like crazy ants. It was something to see!
What was interesting was listening to the conversations going on. Everybody was talking about the impact this will have on the local film industry. Think about it for a second, Sharlto Copley, a close friend of Blomkamp who plays the lead role of Wikus van der Merwe, stands a very good chance of being recognised on most streets around the globe after the release of this surprise hit. He is now world famous! Johannesburg is on everybody’s mind and Americans are probably swearing in Afrikaans. South Africans are probably the only people who will laugh at the accents and the swearing. We will just get it, if you know what I mean, even if the intention isn’t to be funny, it is funny because this movie is so huge and fantastically interesting.
I spoke to some of the actors and people who helped with the set construction and effects. It really was impressive. The scope of the design and the stuff we will probably only see in the 2nd movie is something to look forward to. The movie was made with a budget of $30 million, which is perhaps small for Hollywood but translates into some serious money when converted into Rands. This was not a low budget effort in the South African arena where movie money tends to go a long way, just ask the directors who came to make movies like “The ghost and the darkness”, “Ask the dust” and many more.
District 9 is honestly a great movie. The interpretations of the story are numerous as is the case with any really good movie that does have even the slightest intention of getting the audience to think. It puts up a mirror of sorts for society to look at itself in. Everybody sees something different depending on where you are standing in terms of morality, politics and such things. It is brilliant! This movie will make Van der Merwe jokes a little hard to tell from now on because Wikus van der Merwe came to town. Go see it! It isn’t often that an alien space ship comes to hover over Johannesburg.
It releases on the 28th of August 2009.
Anybody who is anybody in the local film and television industry was there with all the cinemas at The Zone’s commercial movie house used for the screening. The red carpet was long, the stars were out and the buzz was electric. It honestly was! Camera crews were running up and down the very long red carpet like crazy ants. It was something to see!
What was interesting was listening to the conversations going on. Everybody was talking about the impact this will have on the local film industry. Think about it for a second, Sharlto Copley, a close friend of Blomkamp who plays the lead role of Wikus van der Merwe, stands a very good chance of being recognised on most streets around the globe after the release of this surprise hit. He is now world famous! Johannesburg is on everybody’s mind and Americans are probably swearing in Afrikaans. South Africans are probably the only people who will laugh at the accents and the swearing. We will just get it, if you know what I mean, even if the intention isn’t to be funny, it is funny because this movie is so huge and fantastically interesting.
I spoke to some of the actors and people who helped with the set construction and effects. It really was impressive. The scope of the design and the stuff we will probably only see in the 2nd movie is something to look forward to. The movie was made with a budget of $30 million, which is perhaps small for Hollywood but translates into some serious money when converted into Rands. This was not a low budget effort in the South African arena where movie money tends to go a long way, just ask the directors who came to make movies like “The ghost and the darkness”, “Ask the dust” and many more.
District 9 is honestly a great movie. The interpretations of the story are numerous as is the case with any really good movie that does have even the slightest intention of getting the audience to think. It puts up a mirror of sorts for society to look at itself in. Everybody sees something different depending on where you are standing in terms of morality, politics and such things. It is brilliant! This movie will make Van der Merwe jokes a little hard to tell from now on because Wikus van der Merwe came to town. Go see it! It isn’t often that an alien space ship comes to hover over Johannesburg.
It releases on the 28th of August 2009.