TriStar Pictures | 2009 | Rated R | 112 minutes

DISTRICT 9 is unlike most science fiction films dealing with an inordinately large alien spacecraft arriving unexpectedly to the planet Earth to hover menacingly over its cities, in the fact that in this case, it is not the precursor to a massive attack á la INDEPENDENCE DAY. In DISTRICT 9, the spacecraft arrives over Johannesburg, South Africa and just hovers. And hovers. And hovers. After months of waiting, military troops finally fly up to the ship and cut their way in, only to discover millions of aliens huddled together and dying from starvation. The aliens are soon confined in a makeshift refugee camp, District 9, that quickly deteriorates into nothing more than a slum. After more than two decades of having the aliens living in squalor, the company that runs the camp, MNU, decides to relocate them to a new camp outside of the city limits, but not to improve the aliens’ living conditions, but rather because they are an eye sore and something that people in Johannesburg no longer want to deal with. Thus from the onset, DISTRICT 9 becomes more about the forced segregation and relocation of a group deemed to be separate than just your standard “Earth vs. aliens” shoot ‘em up fest. Having the film set in Johannesburg makes it blatantly clear that writer and director Neill Blomkamp is paralleling South Africa’s own past and the effects of apartheid.

While generally a film covering more than three decades of plot would be diluted considerably by the confinement of its under two hour running time, Blomkamp actually employs an ingenious device to bring the audience up to speed on the backstory of the plot and the characters involved. Beginning the movie with a news documentary about the aliens’ arrival and the decision to now relocate them decades later, Blomkamp is able to quickly engage his audience in a constructive way, quickly immersing them in the world he has created so he doesn’t have to rely on gimmicky flashbacks later on in the picture. This also allows him to introduce the viewers to the central figure in the film, Wikus Van De Merwe (Sharlto Copley), a government worker who is more oblivious than sensible in his dealings with the aliens. By utilizing this news story format, Blomkamp’s world is accepted as reality, allowing more screen time to be devoted to the development of the character of Van De Merwe as well as that of the aliens.

Sharito Copley (SPOON) creates a remarkable character in Van De Merwe, making him one that is sympathized with as well as easily detested at varying moments throughout the film. Copley brings such a rich and dynamic texture to his portrayal of Van De Merwe that the audience becomes instantly involved with him as a character and with how he chooses to deal with the aliens. At many times acting against nothing more than CGI alien creations, Copley is still able to give one of the year’s best performances by an actor so far.

As Blomkamp himself is a 3-D animator, having previously worked on shows such as “Smallville,” the visual effects in DISTRICT 9 are astounding, and more remarkably so given that the entire film’s budget was only an estimated $30 million (compared to another visual effects laden film like G.I. Joe that raked up an estimated budget of $170 million). The aliens, nicknamed with the derogatory moniker “prawns,” are absolutely amazing and not only are they able to convey emotions despite having a visage that is an amalgamate of an insect and a crustacean, but also each have their own distinctive personalities. The attention to detail in the CGI is beyond compare and what easily makes DISTRICT 9 stand out among other films in the genre. Produced by Peter Jackson (THE LORD OF THE RINGS TRILOGY), it is apparent that the shared vision on the film was to create a visually outstanding and unique world, but not to get lost within that world so much so that the emphasis on character was forsaken.

DISTRICT 9 could have been a much better movie than it was though. With numerous plot holes throughout the script, the film unfortunately fell apart as it transitioned from its second to its third act, devolving exactly into the shoot ‘em up fare that it had the initial promise of avoiding. While visually stunning, the inevitable final battle becomes too reminiscent of a scene from IRON MAN and feels out of place in a movie that had devoted so much attention to detail to the development of character.

Still, DISTRICT 9 is a creative imagining of a science fiction world that speaks volumes about the injustices humanity can force upon another group who are viewed as being different than the collective. With Copley’s brilliant performance, and had the third act been reworked, DISTRICT 9 could have been an easy contender for one of the year’s top films. As it stands though, it is a typical grade sci-fi flick with some impressive visual effects, and innovative storytelling twists thrown in.

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