Review of District 9 (2009) by Athena P — 26 Jun 2013

This film is quite an achievement. It ranks up there with Blade Runner, The Matrix, and some of Paul Verhoeven's works as one of the best sci-fi action films loaded with substance. Take the substance away (specifically the socio-political, racism, Apartheid type stuff), and this would still be a decent action film. Adding in all of that heavy stuff makes it more than just a fun piece of entertainment. With that stuff, it retains its entertainment value, and also avoids being too heavy handed, preachy, or pretentious.

The way the film is constructed is brillaint. The faux dosumentary hand held stuff is done well, and isn't annoying or distracting. It puts the viewer in the middle of the action, adding to the intensity of things, and, by being a faux-documentary, the film can unveil the backstory and exposition in a unique way which doesn't bring things to a halt.

My only nit-pick is that, of the humans, Wikus is the only character that is fully developed. The rest are barely developed, and come of as cliches. Not a big problem, but it is one of this films (very) few faults. Sharlto Copley has, at the time of my review, already hit the mainstream U.S. market with The A-Team, but this will stand as his breakout performance. He is terrific. You are not supposed to like the guy. He is an incompetent, ineffectual corporate tool, but you come to care about him and root for him. His faults are endearing one minute, and aggravating the next. The transition between these two feelings is subtle, and done well, as it should be.

I love intellectual anything, especially sci-fi, but I also love my violence, and when the two are combined, and done so in a way that works, the results are usually amazing. It can be hard to mix these types of things, but it works here. Speaking of which: the alien weapons are awesome, and I love that their technology has a catch to it. I think it would have been cool had the prawns been done with animatronics, but it would have been pretty hard to pull off. The CGI though, thankfully, looks fantastic, and this is one of those cases where I support how it is used. The effects for the transforming, gross as they are, look outstanding. It reminded me of Cronenberg's The Fly, and I'm happy that it didn't come off as a rip off of it.

Obviously I recommend this, How could I not with all the praise I've given it? I also think that, if done right, sequel is actually warranted. If not, that's ok though. The concept of this film, and how the arrival of aliens is handled, is really ingenious. Unfortunately, I fear that what happens in this film is probably close to what would take place if the same thing happened in real life.

When you really look at this movie in broad terms, it is true that it borrows from some classic tropes, but it puts it's own neat spin on things, so I think that can be forgiven. Definitely give this a watch.