Like everyone else I'd been seeing trailers for the movie 'District 9' for a couple of months now but I'd never really rated it as a 'must see', alien invasions; not my thing. Then last week I heard that it had been pulled from all the cinemas in Nigeria and Information Minister; Dora Akunyili had [on behalf of Nigeria] written a letter to Sony Entertainment, who distributes 'District 9' to edit out the scenes in which Nigerians were portrayed in a not so favourable light.
Of course that got my amebo juices flowing and I had to go see what all the fuss was about, so one cold, windy night in Canary Wharf, I and my friends formed a Nigerian contingent and went to see what the dilly was. Let's just say I came out of there pissed as hell! I'm not an overly patriotic Nigerian but that movie was an effing piss take, they managed to insult us as a nation on every level. Not to be a complete hater, it was a good movie, engaging, action packed etc, i mean it wasn't my thing but I was able to sit through it [though I think that had more to do with the 8 pounds I paid to see the damn thing, compared to the 500 naira I usually pay at Silverbird or the 150 naira I'd have given to my homie down the road who'd have hit me up wit a bootleg right quick].
But I digress, back to the point 'District 9' is about aliens and humans co-existing side by side in Johannesburg and the movie begins when the South African government try to relocate the aliens from District 9 to another district where they won't be in such proximity with humans. So where my poor countrymen come in, is that within District 9, they're the only humans that live there and they're involved in arms selling, trading with the aliens, cannibalism, ritual killing, inter-species prostitution [wtf!] and the biggest insult of all, the gang leader is called 'Obasanjo'!. Now I'm all for freedom of expression and media and press or whatnot, after all I'm a writer, but this is actually extreme. In the first instance the movie is directed by a South African , Neill Blomkamp and set in South Africa but I can count on one hand how many times South Africa was mentioned in that movie, what I kept hearing was 'the Nigerians' this and 'the Nigerians' that. They made sure they didn't leave the viewers in any doubt as to who the criminals in the movie were, we were basically reduced to the level of the aliens maybe even lower, as in INTER SPECIES PROSTITUTION!!! What the hell! Nigerian girls sleeping with the aliens, who btw looked like giant prawns. I left the cinema thoroughly disgusted. Plus the sheer audacity of naming the gang leader Obasanjo was mind boggling, granted he's no Winston Churchill but that was just immensely disrespectful. Imagine Nigerian filmmakers making movies about South African gangsters and naming the leader Nelson Mandela, I doubt if that will fly. If they wanted that calibre of people in their movie seeing as the movie is set in Johannesburg, why not make the gangsters local South Africans? Instead they had to go all the way to West Africa and put Nigerians in a movie that should not have concerned them in the first place.
At the end of the movie, I actually stayed behind so I could see the credits and see if any Nigerian was foolish enough to actually be a cast member and what did I see? A foolish Nigerian called SAINT GREGORY NWOKEDI [we need to find this dude and set him straight]. How much could they have paid that man to appear in a movie that portrayed his country in such a damnable light, plus he's an Ibo man, I know my kinsmen like the Benjamins but I didn't think it was to this level. I am very dissapointed in the entire production team and I wholeheartedly support the Nigerian governments stand of banning 'District 9' from all the cinemas, at leat we won't participate in helping the movie make any more money.
I'm pretty sure I'm gonna get a lot of flak over this but I don't care. Some people are saying its Nigeria's fault in the first place because of the way we portray ourselves in Nollywood movies but I tell you, Nollywood is very far from District 9. The light in which my country is cast in this movie is a very unforgiving light and most people may think its not that serious and people don't really pay attention to things like this, but you'd be surprised at the kind of things the human brain internalizes. There are too many misinformed people in this world and movies like District 9 compund this misinformation, people who have no idea what Ngeria is like would have an even worse idea after seeing this movie. For example that gbegborun Perez Hilton put up a post about it and said maybe the Nigerian government should focus on running their country and not bothering about movies. To correct the misinformed Mr Hilton, only the Ministry of Information is involved in the boycotting of District 9 and it is their job to preserve Nigeria's public image as that ministry is essentially Nigeria's PR agency, so dude get your facts straight before mouthing off.
In conclusion, everybody go see that movie, we need to know what we're up against in this world but i urge you, if you're not Nigerian, to regard the scenes containing Nigerians as utter fabrication. Like every other country we have our problems but we did not deserve District 9. Oh and newsflash the FBI list of top internet scam countries goes thus:
1) United States of America - 66%
2) United Kingdom - 10%
3) Nigeria - 7%
Well what do we have here, a mere 7%, whoulda thunk it? Someone needs to go tell the ad agency that handles the Sony Playstation 3 account, me thinks that ad has got to be re-written as "an American internet millionaire" non?
Tuesday, September 22, 2009
Tuesday, September 15, 2009
UNO MOMENTO
Wanna take a minute to let y'all now that I'm having a blast! Its been a jumpoff night after night, pictures when I get back to Nigeria. To all my darlings taking care of me (Achike, Hilda, Ediri, Biz) love you guys!
P.S. Going for a Derby match this Sunday, Man U vs Man City. I'm not a soccer fan but I'm super super excited. going to make a lot of people veeery jealous (you know yourselves). Look out for me on the North Stand, Tier 3, Row 3, Seat 90. I'm gonna be the girl in the Spitfire, taking pictures of Rooney, Scholes, Robinho, Adebayor and co and bb'ing them to my brother who's gonna be weeping with envy.
Oh yeah and if any of y'all reading this are in London, hit me up, I'm a jobless woman
Bisous xxx
P.S. Going for a Derby match this Sunday, Man U vs Man City. I'm not a soccer fan but I'm super super excited. going to make a lot of people veeery jealous (you know yourselves). Look out for me on the North Stand, Tier 3, Row 3, Seat 90. I'm gonna be the girl in the Spitfire, taking pictures of Rooney, Scholes, Robinho, Adebayor and co and bb'ing them to my brother who's gonna be weeping with envy.
Oh yeah and if any of y'all reading this are in London, hit me up, I'm a jobless woman
Bisous xxx
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