Some Non with Your Fiction?

I saw the new movie "District 9" recently. It was a good film, and I thought the use of extraterrestrials as a socially disadvantaged class was an interesting way to bring social commentary into an action picture. (Although more accurately, the movie is really a socially conscious drama that happens to feature a lot of action and ultraviolence.)

What I didn't realize until today is that the "alien" ghetto in the film isn't just a metaphor for the South African township of Soweto; it was actually filmed there. The shacks in which the aliens live are not sets; they're the homes of human beings who live in Soweto today. The movie that I thought was a historical commentary on apartheid turns out to be a very modern criticism of its legacy. It's a very sobering thought, but it makes me appreciate "District 9" even more.