Roger Ebert’s Review:

I suppose there’s no reason the first alien race to reach the Earth shouldn’t look like what the cat threw up. After all, they love to eat cat food. The alien beings in “District 9,” nicknamed “prawns” because they look like a cross between lobsters and grasshoppers, arrive in a space ship that hovers over Johannesburg. Found inside, huddled together and starving to death, are the aliens, who benefit from a humanitarian impulse to relocate them to a location on the ground.

Here they become not welcomed but feared, and their camp turns into a prison. Fearing alien attacks, humans demand they be resettled far from town, and a clueless bureaucrat named Wikus van der Merwe (Sharlto Copley) is placed in charge of this task. The creatures are not eager to move. A private security force, headed by van der Merwe, moves in with armored vehicles and flame-throwers to encourage them, and van der Merwe cheerfully destroys houses full of their young.

Who are these aliens? Where did they come from? How did their ship apparently run out of power (except what’s necessary to levitate its massive tonnage?). No one asks: They’re here, we don’t like them, get them out of town. There doesn’t seem to be a lot to like. In appearance, they’re loathsome, in behavior disgusting and evoke so little sympathy that killing one is like — why, like dropping a 7-foot lobster into boiling water.

This science-fiction fable, directed by newcomer Neill Blomkamp and produced by Peter (“The Lord of the Rings”) Jackson, takes the form of a mockumentary about van der Merwe’s relocation campaign, his infection by an alien virus, his own refuge in District 9 and his partnership with the only alien who behaves intelligently and reveals, dare we say, human emotions. This alien, named Christopher Johnson — yes, Christopher Johnson — has a secret workspace where he prepares to return to the mothership and help his people.

Much of the plot involves the obsession of the private security firm in learning the secret of the alien weapons, which humans cannot operate. Curiously, none of these weapons seem superior to those of the humans and aren’t used to much effect by the aliens in their own defense. Never mind. After van der Merwe grows a lobster claw in place of a hand, he can operate the weapons, and thus becomes the quarry of both the security company and the Nigerian gangsters, who exploit the aliens by selling them cat food. All of this is presented very seriously.

The film’s South African setting brings up inescapable parallels with its now-defunct apartheid system of racial segregation. Many of them are obvious, such as the action to move a race out of the city and to a remote location. Others will be more pointed in South Africa. The title “District 9” evokes Cape Town’s historic District 6, where Cape Coloureds (as they were called then) owned homes and businesses for many years before being bulldozed out and relocated. The hero’s name, van der Merwe, is not only a common name for Afrikaners, the white South Africans of Dutch descent, but also the name of the protagonist of van der Merwe jokes, of which the point is that the hero is stupid. Nor would it escape a South African ear that the alien language incorporates clicking sounds, just as Bantu, the language of a large group of African apartheid targets.

Certainly this van der Merwe isn’t the brightest bulb on the tree. Wearing a sweater vest over a short-sleeve shirt, he walks up to alien shanties and asks them to sign a relocation consent form. He has little sense of caution, which is why he finds himself in his eventual predicament. What Neill Blomkamp somehow does is make Christopher Johnson and his son, Little CJ, sympathetic despite appearances. This is achieved by giving them, but no other aliens, human body language, and little CJ even gets big wet eyes, like E.T.

“District 9” does a lot of things right, including giving us aliens to remind us not everyone who comes in a spaceship need be angelic, octopod or stainless steel. They are certainly alien, all right. It is also a seamless merger of the mockumentary and special effects (the aliens are CGI). And there’s a harsh parable here about the alienation and treatment of refugees.

But the third act is disappointing, involving standard shoot-out action. No attempt is made to resolve the situation, and if that’s a happy ending, I’ve seen happier. Despite its creativity, the movie remains space opera and avoids the higher realms of science-fiction.

I’ll be interested to see if general audiences go for these aliens. I said they’re loathsome and disgusting, and I don’t think that’s just me. The movie mentions Nigerian prostitutes servicing the aliens, but wisely refrains from entertaining us with this spectacle.

My Review:
It was bizarre. I mean not bizarre like Clockwork Orange or Brazil (two movies I thought were bizarre). It was about these aliens who get stuck on planet earth in Johannesburg, South Africa. About 1.8 million of them. Their mother ship was stuck above the town of Johannesburg. So they transported all 1.8 million of them to District 9. Sort of like internment camps. They were supposed to stay in that enclosed area district 9. But they were there for 20 years so they ended up mingling with humans sometimes and some humans went into their district to make profit off of them. Riots would break out when they enter human towns. They were in love with cat food. Anyway, the main character Wikus Van De Merwe was in charge of moving all the aliens to another area 240 Km away “District 10″ which was supposedly worse than District 9. They just wanted them to be as far away from humans as possible. He worked for MNU (Multi-national United). They were in charge of the aliens. Anyway Wikus and other MNU officials went to shanty to shanty serving the aliens with eviction notices. They were backed up by heavy security and firearms. These aliens can be very violent. Anyway, three aliens were working hard to get their mothership to work again so that they can leave the planet and return for the rest of their people. Wikus gets involved in this scheme because of an unfortunate event that occurred to him. And that’s all I’ll say. I don’t want to give the plot away. It wasn’t what I expected. I mean I saw trailers for it, but they really didn’t tell me what it was about. There are some cool special effects with the alien technology. I give it three out of five stars. I didn’t think it was a summer blockbuster. However, the movie was such that there could be a sequel. After watching it, I thought that the director/producer/writer etc. were trying to make a political statement about the conditions in South Africa. So I wikied it and it did indeed have a political message. Don’t wiki it all because of spoilers.

District 9 is a 2009 science fiction film directed by Neill Blomkamp, released August 13, 2009 internationally and August 14, 2009 in North America.[2] It takes place in Johannesburg, South Africa. District 9 is based on Alive in Joburg, a short film directed by Neill Blomkamp, Sharlto Copley, Simon Hansen and Shanon Worley. The title and plot elements are influenced by the real-life District 6 in Cape Town. Copley also portrayed one of the interviewed policemen. The short film is about aliens landing in South Africa and becoming confined to a specific area and forced to work.
-wikipedia

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