Directed by:
Neill BlomkampCinematography:
Trent OpalochComposer:
Clinton ShorterCast:
Sharlto Copley, Jason Cope, David James, Vanessa Haywood, Mandla Gaduka, Kenneth Nkosi, Eugene Khumbanyiwa, Louis Minnaar, William Allen Young, Robert Hobbs (more)VOD (3)
Plots(1)
With stunning special effects and gritty realism, the film plunges us into a world where the aliens have landed... only to be exiled to a slum on the fringes of Johannesburg. Now, one lone human discovers the mysterious secret of the extraterrestrial weapon technology. Hunted and hounded through the bizarre back alleys of an alien shantytown, he will discover what it means to be the ultimate outsider on your own planet. (official distributor synopsis)
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Reviews (16)
The prawns would probably love Whiskas, but personally I would prefer to pay entrance for a movie that had it clear in its head whether it wants to be a sloppy B sci-fi where the worse it is the better, or E.T., Transformers, Children of Men or War with Newts. I’m not saying that it can’t be combined into one whole, but certainly not by forcibly changing genre every quarter of an hour, forgetting about everything that has come before and shaking a stolen closed circuit camera around like a maniac. I followed the trend presented by Blomkamp and within fifteen minutes I forgot that I had ever seen this movie.
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A documentary insight spoiled by senseless perspectives from "outside", a bizarre exaggeration of side storylines, and glaring logical absurdities. Plus one solid action scene. This script simply hit a wall after ten minutes, as it unfolded into pig soldiers, insane scientists, and ritualistic Nigerians. Additionally, the only likable character is the sidelined alien Christopher, who outshines the selfish Wikus in almost everything. Every battle clash must be accompanied by some bloody effect, prostitutes sleep with aliens (??), and Neill Blomkamp clearly resonates with the taste of the audience and critical majority, who applaud him for the gritty atmosphere. But for me not at all, so for those few solid (although quickly drowned) ideas, this is the best he'll get.
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I resisted the seductive call of the DVDrip so I could watch this film for the first time in the cinema, and now I can say that I would have been furious with myself if I had missed it. Neil Blomkamp delivers a great science fiction film, the best in recent years (and what’s nice is that this isn’t the first time this year that I say this, and maybe not even the last, re: Moon and Avatar). I respect the radical style change between the first and second halves, but I loved the first half better because it’s something incredible and never seen before in the genre and in this form. Rather than to Cloverfield, District 9 is more similar to the unknown Japanese horror film Noroi the Curse, which keeps the documentary format uninterrupted for its entire runtime. The events of the second half could not be captured as a “documentary”, that was very clear to me. Even though it reaches its “WOW” peak somewhere at the beginning, the rest of film is so striking and breathtaking that it was a joy to watch. The occasional lapses in the script are easy to ignore – they aren’t as big as I’ve read in some reviews. I recommend it. Edit: The second viewing brings the rating down to four.
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Definitely the surprise of the year. I really didn’t expect D9 to be this good. The original approach of the guy who I’d almost written off during the test shots for Halo blew my mind. Blomkamp knows his stuff. He’s good at provoking mixed feelings, where you don’t know whether to laugh or be disgusted. The whole movie is supported by an amazing performance from the unknown Sharlto Copley and his Wikus is everything but a good-guy main lead. Regardless everything he does at the beginning, the viewer still can be on board with him. Most of the people and the prawns, are bastards anyway. When I think about it, the only actual good guy was Chris. :-) It’s the best sci-fi so far this year (but this will probably be beaten by Avatar which comes out December 17th). This year’s Terminator can go take a walk. - Should I shoot the little bastard? - , you can’t shoot it now, it’s illegal to do that.
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I’ll say up front that it's a better 4 stars, because I'm still a bit bleary eyed. It was there, what people are like. There was action. There were powerful weapons. There were interesting aliens. It was cool X-D I'm so freaked out about it. It's definitely worth a movie ticket. It really was beautifully believable, the documentary style didn't hurt it, at all. Watch it again? Why not. Well, the best part was the use of the "dusting" gun anyway. I guess I'm a weirdo for liking it... In short: I have such a hard-to-describe feeling about this movie, but my cheeks are burning, which means it was good and that I paid maximum attention.
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