quote:

Originally posted by stonelance:


I loved Contact, but I wouldn't really call it believable. Perhaps the physics of it just seemed silly to me. The rest of the movie was great.

Hah, well, there's always the option to believe that alien technology is so advanced as to allow for wormhole technology. If you haven't already you should read the book by Carl Sagan.

Matthew McConnaughey's presence in Contact is much more offensive than the suspension of belief it takes to imagine advanced alien technology.

It was no attack on your views Kali, this film is in every way a direct commentary to Aparteid.
The main character even has the same name as the main guy that is hated by all of the people who suffered aparteid.
the alien character christopher is named after one of the people that actually existed.

District 9 IS district 6. the real shanty town where all of the Afrikkaners were put after their homes and business's were destroyed by white South africans.

On the subject of Aliens and human contact,
Here is how I see it.

If they just arrived in the way the movie shows,
The world governments would be all over it. they would try to control the situation as to not start a public panic.

They would Isolate the aliens in order to avoid any type of other-worldly contamination from affecting humans.

The govenments would also vie for control over the International issue and definitely would be trying to gain control of the alien weaponry and Tech which is what happened in the film and was shown as a primary motivation within the film.

I mean personally if aliens came to earth and didn't want to destroy us or eat us I would think it is great.

But lets look at reality for a second.

IF Aliens landed, There would be a fundamental shift in power planet wide.
Primarily within the religious community's. Once the Aliens were asked who they believed in and they didn't say Christ or Allah or Jehovah or any other accepted diety, It would cause Religion to crumble and weaken to the point that society would rebel.

And that is only the beginning.

If Aliens have already been to this planet, which I believe they have been visiting regularly for centuries, Govenments would try to Isolate public knowledge of it in order to maintain their own fragile hold onto power.

Carl Sagen was a Genius and I have read his books, which still hold up even now, But even he knew the government would try to control information about their existence.

Unfortunately, I think you hit it right on the head, Evil. As advanced and "prepared" as we like to think that we are, the reality of aliens arriving would expose our darkest side. While scientists would hail their arrival, politicians and military types would see them as either a threat, or something to be exploited. I think that fundamentalist groups (any religion, not just Christian) would actually increase, as their leaders would use the alien arrival to signify the "end of the world" is upon us.

quote:

Originally posted by Mutton_Chop_Yaz:
Matthew McConnaughey's presence in Contact is much more offensive than the suspension of belief it takes to imagine advanced alien technology.

You really want to post here that badly that you would circumvent a ban?

Oh yeah, and as far as the movie goes...District 7.5. Good, but not great. A little too long, but the second half of the movie is great, and the effects are integrated really well. I ended up liking the aliens more than the main character.

quote:

Originally posted by Anim8rJB:
You really want to post here that badly that you would circumvent a ban?

I'll do you one better.

Why do you even care?

And it was two account suspensions and one IP address ban - all in the same day, no less.

quote:

Originally posted by Mutton_Chop_Yaz:

quote:

Originally posted by Anim8rJB:
You really want to post here that badly that you would circumvent a ban?

I'll do you one better.

Why do you even care?

And it was two account suspensions and one IP address ban - all in the same day, no less.

I really don't; I was just curious.

Which begs the question, why ask to begin with?

It's no coincidence both words start with the same letter....

Besides, I hardly count using another computer as a circumvention of a ban.

quote:

Originally posted by stonelance:

I loved Contact, but I wouldn't really call it believable. Perhaps the physics of it just seemed silly to me. The rest of the movie was great.

This is going to sound played out, but the book was better. Because Sagan had the time in the book the physics make more sense. He does a good job of explaining the worm hole network and how it works. Also there are several mathematical "oddities" that he presents that are fun.

I give the movie a 7, mostly due to the main character annoying the F out of me.

quote:

Originally posted by Mutton_Chop_Yaz:
Besides, I hardly count using another computer as a circumvention of a ban.

You were banned & you came back... Pretty sure that's the exact definition of circumventing a ban.

I like South Park's Mr. Garrison's description of Contact.

And yes, creating a new account on a different IP address is considered circumventing a ban. But this isn't my forum, so I'll let the gals decide what to do.

Why does every body think that if aliens exist then they have to be smarter than us? Any body ever think that they might be just as smart as us or maybe even dumber?

I was talking about how someone should a movie on that very topic, Mikey

Well if they have the ability to fly across space and come to our planet and we can't even land someone on Mars then it is probably safe to say they are smarter than us. I think that is the general common concept in sci fi movies.

I agree with you however if in the film we were the ones to discover space travel and fly to another planet first.

quote:

Originally posted by QuestionMar1988:
Why does every body think that if aliens exist then they have to be smarter than us? Any body ever think that they might be just as smart as us or maybe even dumber?

If aliens visit us, they are most likely smarter than us. If we visit aliens, there is a good chance that we are smarter than they are.

You have to think about the mastery of technology it would take to navigate the stars in order to do such a thing.

quote:

Originally posted by stonelance:
Well if they have the ability to fly across space and come to our planet and we can't even land someone on Mars then it is probably safe to say they are smarter than us. I think that is the general common concept in sci fi movies.

Of course we don't know enough about the District 9 aliens to know how they got to Earth, or where they were from.

This may not be the best example, but look at Wall-E. Humans had the technology to build space stations and robots, but after 700 years in space, humanity's reliance on such advanced tech left them lazy and stupid.

So while the aliens in District 9 may have once been intelligent enough to build a massive mothership, perhaps built to flee their homeworld, and over time the intelligent members of their race dwindled.

I figure they are like a hive like species. Maybe the leader caste are telepathic. Somehow, we may never know, the leaders died out and left the rest of the aliens all weird and stuff. Like in Ender's Game.

Or maybe if aliens came they'd just do what this chick is doing

Interesting article about production of District 9 and some background info on the aliens:

http://io9.com/5341120/5-thing...now-about-district-9