From producer Peter Jackson and director Neill Blomkamp comes a stunningly original sci-fi thriller, throwing viewers headlong into an escalating conflict between alien refugees and Johannesburg locals. Only one man, hunted and hounded, will come to understand what it truly means to be an outsider.
1982, Johannesburg, South Africa: A large alien spaceship hovers above the city carrying hundreds of thousands of ailing extraterrestrial creatures that the population of the 'Joburg' would soon come to unaffectionately refer to as 'Prawns'.
Twenty-eight years later and tensions are mounting. The `Prawns' live in a militarized ghetto zone called District 9 where they are confined in squalor. Munitions company Multi-National United is contracted to remove the extraterrestrial element with force to a distant compound. Unexpectedly, bureaucrat Wikus van der Merwe supervises the military charge. However, when Wikus discovers an unknown substance and accidentally ingests it, he soon becomes the most hunted man in Johannesburg. Alone and stripped of his former life, Wikus' only allies are the creatures he once sought to banish.
Play.com Review
Taking elements from Close Encounters Of The Third Kind, David Cronenberg's The Fly, and cult eighties hit Alien Nation, District 9 is an expansion of director Neill Blomkamp's 2005 short film Alive In Joburg. Filmed in a gritty handheld documentary style, the movie thrusts viewers right into the heat of the action, capturing the full force of mounting tensions between the otherworldly immigrants and the bitter locals. Throw in some scathing social satire, remarkable - and sometimes grotesque - special effects (on a comparatively low budget), and some Hollywood-beating action scenes and you've got a movie that ticks all the boxes.
As for the cast, Sharlto Copley - soon to be seen as Captain `Howling Mad' Murdock in the A-Team Movie - is a revelation as Wikus; mixing pathos, naiveté and desperation to remarkable effect. And that's not forgetting the alien creatures themselves: veering from super strong, insatiable scavengers to thoughtful and intelligent freedom fighters, these CGI creations hold up remarkably well, and `Christopher', one of Wikus' only allies, is a wholly sympathetic and likeable character, in stark contrast to the majority of the nefarious individuals who prowl the slums in search of Wikus.
District 9 comes at a time when juggernauts such as Avatar, Terminator Salvation, Star Trek and Transformers: Revenge Of The Fallen are on the scene, and it easily holds its own against the competition. More cerebral and exciting than the average sci-fi action flick, we urge you to take a trip to District 9 and experience one of the most exciting and original movies of the decade.- Click here to play the Play.com District 9 MNU Alert Game
- Director's Commentary
- The Alien Agenda: A Filmmaker's Log Three-Part Documentary
- Koobus Big Gun
- The Alien Agenda: A Filmmaker's Log - Chapter 3: Refining District 9
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