District 9 - A Review

District 9 is an unusual movie. Very unusual indeed.


The movie is about an alien ship in human airspace that could no longer fly, leaving the aliens stranded on Earth. The aliens, looking like prawns, were brilliantly named Prawns by the human. They were relocated on Earth in District 9. But after many years here, District 9 became a slum, where the Prawns savaged on rubbish and anything else that they can put their very ugly hands on. Then the Multi National United (MNU) decided to relocated these growing number of Prawns into another alines. Wikus Van Der Morwe (Sharlto Copley) was one of the officers serving eviction notice to the aliens. Then he got sprayed in the face by some black fluid and acquired alien DNA. He was turning into a Prawn and was hunted down by the humans to do experiments on him. He had no where else to go but back to District 9 where there appears to be a Slumdog Millionaire Prawn, named Christopher Johnson, with a slightly larger brain than the rest. They worked together, took back a silver tube of substance and Christopher flew back to their planet, not knowing if he will come back to cure Wikus of his "transformation".


I have to give credit to Neill Blomkamp, for writing and directing this movie with such fashion. The whole movie was shot in a very realistic angle, documentary like angle. And this is only one story that I've come across where aliens were not superior to human beings. And to paint them as very ugly looking tentacle faced Prawns, not green little stick people with a triangular head. And kudos to the visual effects team and the make up artists. Everything, including the transformation and the Prawns looked awfully real.


I also must thank the whole crew for giving me goosebumps the entire evening. Prawns and human alike, were being mercilessly hacked, torn apart, blew part, and many more. Judging by the amount of blood, gore, brains and internal organs flying around the screen, I thought I was watching Final Destination, Saw I, II, III, and maybe even the gory 300, all add together. And this one is like 100 times more realistic. Thank God I didn't eat before the movie. And the idea of inter-species prostitutes, and "riding a Prawn, pony- style"? Yuck!! Not to mention the self mutilation of Wikus by chopping off his finger to experiment if he can naively remove his alien appendage. Also, I must thank the script writers for temporarily changing my speech patterns. Dear old Wikus was creatively saying "Fokking" the very Irish style in every sentence he said. It was really fokking annoying to hear so many fokking noise over all those fokking gore flying all over the fokking screen and at the same time fokking catch up with the fokking messy camera work with the fokking fast paced storyline. Well, you get the idea.


And there is this really big hole in the plot. Wikus got sprayed by a black fluid that is suppose to be fuel to the Mothership. How can fuel possibly alter one's DNA while the very disgusting Nigeria Mafia who consumed the entire Prawn limb raw was still very human up till the moment some metal thing sticking out of his "dislocated" brain? And how come there is only ONE smart alien among the alleged 2000 Prawns? The ship don't just fly into human space with only ONE brain and 1999 idiots. Or maybe it did. Also, the aliens stayed on Earth for less than a decade, how can human and Prawn communicate so well, the way Wikus and Christopher did? I swear it was better communication than normal couples can. I mean, Wikus understood muttered clicks and Christopher understood English?


Ratings : 6/10
Comments : I am not a bloody person. If I want to see mindless hacking, I will watch Final Destination, Saw or 300, separately. The idea is good no doubt. But, not really my cup of tea.