Reviews
Premiere - A great-looking and smart film. It has enough action, wonder, depth, and action to keep any fan of the genre happy. The sociological undertones here are fascinating as well., Los Angeles Times - In a good summer, there's usually a movie that will come out of nowhere and completely wow us. This is a good summer, and that movie is DISTRICT 9, USA Today - With its clever faux documentary style, this is the most imaginative science-fiction movie to come along in years., The New Yorker - You don't feel bamboozled, fooled, or patronized by DISTRICT 9, as you did by most of the summer blockbusters. You feel winded, and shaken, and shamed., New York Times - In the midst of it all you almost take for granted the carefully rendered details of the setting, the tightness of the editing and the inventiveness of the special effects, Hollywood Reporter - A genuinely original science fiction film that grabs you immediately, not letting go until the final shot, Empire - It's a genuinely exciting and surprisingly affecting thriller that, thanks to Blomkamp's stylistic device of choice ù a faux-documentary, with plenty of Paul Greengrass-esque shakycam ù feels fresh and original, with the outlandish action rooted in a grimy reality., Washington Post - A sci-fi-fueled indictment of man's inhumanity to man -- and the non-human -- DISTRICT 9 is all horribly familiar, and transfixing.
Additional Information
Director Neill Blomkamp teams with producer Peter Jackson (LORD OF THE RINGS) for this tale of extraterrestrial refugees stuck in contemporary South Africa. It's been 28 years since the aliens made first contact, but there was never any attack from the skies, nor any profound technological revelation capable of advancing our society. Instead, the aliens were treated as refugees. They were the last of their kind, and in order to accommodate them, the government of South Africa set up a makeshift home in District 9 as politicians and world leaders debated how to handle the situation. As the humans begin to grow wary of the unwelcome intruders, a private company called Multi-National United (MNU) is assigned the task of controlling the aliens. But MNU is less interested in the aliens' welfare than attempting to understand how their weaponry works. Should they manage to make that breakthrough, they will receive tremendous profits to fund their research. Unfortunately, the highly advanced weaponry requires alien DNA in order to be activated. When MNU field operative Wikus van der Merwe (Sharlto Copley) is exposed to biotechnology that causes his DNA to mutate, the tensions between the aliens and the humans intensifies. Wikus is the key to unlocking the alien's technology, and he quickly becomes the most wanted man on the planet. Ostracized and isolated, Wikus retreats to District 9 in a desperate bid to shake his dogged pursuers.
