District 9 – Review

Reviews, Top Story

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Director: Neill Blomkamp
Notable Cast: Sharlto Copley, David James, Vanessa Haywood, Mandla Gaduka, Kenneth Nkosi, Jason Cope (voice)

In recent weeks op-ed pieces have been written about general audiences and whether or not they’re too dumb to enjoy “smart” movies. What constitutes a smart movie is debatable, as is what’s considered entertainment. Sometimes the best advice for filmmakers is to outsmart the audience by downplaying the subtext contained in their works and emphasize the action and effects in the advertising. Science-fiction films, or those containing sci-fi elements, are a great example of this.

But for every Children of Men, which refrains from ray guns and space suits, you have movies that exaggerate aliens and action over all else. The biggest film of the year to date, Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen, is robot-on-robot action for two-and-a-half hours with little semblance of plot structure.

District 9 is one of the best releases of the year in any genre, and it’s a film that recalls other of its ilk: like Alien Nation and David Cronenberg’s The Fly. It also illustrates what a summer movie can be without the bloated production costs. To compare, Neill Blomkamp’s debut feature cost $30 million, while G.I. Joe had a price tag of $175 million.

Taken at face value an alien mothership hovering over Johannesburg, South Africa seems implausible. Not because it’s an unidentified flying object, but because it’s not hovering over some metropolis in the United States. And that’s one of many lasting images.

The film opens in documentary style and we get a recap of what has transpired in Johannesburg over the course of twenty years. The Africans sensed that a hostile attack was to occur with the mysterious arrival. It didn’t. Three months go by before an exploratory crew cuts its way into the ship to find a million malnourished alien drones. The drones walk upright, have a crustacean appearance – with lobster claws and scales – and are referred to as “Prawns” because of the similarity. In a sign of good faith, and because the world is watching everything that happens, an operation commences to transport the aliens to ground level where they can be fed and given shelter. The shelter is a makeshift refugee camp called District 9.

The shantytown with its filth and debris matriculates from being a place of refuge to being a place of concentration. The Prawns have grown in number and the public becomes restless, wanting the aliens to just go away. There are incidents of the Prawns derailing railroad cars and setting fire to nearby businesses. Signs are posted around Johannesburg to strictly reinforce “humans only” areas. When tensions between the Prawns and the humans become too heated, the Multi-National United Corporation (MNU) – think the U.N. meets Halliburton – has the task of evicting 1.8 million alien residents from their cardboard and tin metal lean-tos. (In these sensitive times of political correctness, to eradicate the aliens would have been a PR nightmare.)

The operation is handled Wikus Van De Merwe (Sharlto Copley), a pen pusher who’s given the promotion of field operative. Wilkus lacks experience and it shows when they encroach upon the shantytown, going door-to-door, and he comes into contact with a mysterious alien liquid.

That’s enough with the plot divulging because pressing further means to spoil the surprise.

This has been summer of highs and lows. While I will say it is one of the worst summers on record, it has been a showcase for newcomers in the director’s chair. Duncan Jones (Moon), Marc Webb (500 Days of Summer) and Blomkamp are three directors who have gone from directing music videos and commercials to have impressive directing debuts in cinema. If only David Fincher could have been so lucky with Alien 3.

Blomkamp has a visual eye and works within his means. The faux documentary style, with handheld photography (as well as first-person views from the gun barrels of assault rifles), black-and-white camera feeds and washed-out hues, gives it the effect of a contemporary science fiction film meshed with the backdrop of Slumdog Millionaire.

With its depth and engrossing story, the film is rarity of recent science-fiction cinema. And it’s totally deserving of an R-rating for bloody violence and body count, as well. The message presented is one of suggestion on how humans would treat those from another planet if forced to cohabitate. Patience would wane and xenophobia and greed would take its place. It’s no wonder so many movies with aliens have them as the antagonists. They’ve seen the damage we have done to each other; why would they want to subjugate themselves to such treatment?

The biggest question remaining is if audiences will embrace District 9 as a whole and not just value the blood-soaked action. Let’s do risk assessment. It has no star power except for Peter Jackson (Lord of the Rings) as producer. Even without a marquee presence this mini sci-fi action opus offers much more than many of the popcorn movies that have preceded it this year. It’s a film about the pathos of the human condition, yet told with sequences that put the Hasbro toys to shame.

FINAL RATING (ON A SCALE OF 1-5 BUCKETS):




Travis Leamons is one of the Inside Pulse Originals and currently holds the position of Managing Editor at Inside Pulse Movies. He's told that the position is his until he's dead or if "The Boss" can find somebody better. I expect the best and I give the best. Here's the beer. Here's the entertainment. Now have fun. That's an order!