I think by now, everyone knows the story of how District 9 came to be. At least I assume everyone does. Well the story goes 3 or so years ago Universal and Fox came to Peter Jackson offering him a live action adaptation of Halo. Jackson enlisted a then-26-year-old South African filmmaker by the name of Neill Blomkamp to direct. But later on, the project kinda collapsed and the studios pulled the plug. But being interested in Blomkamp, Jackson still wanted to make a movie with him. District 9 is the result.
Made for $30 million and shot in Johannesburg and Wellington, District 9 tells the story of Wikus Van de Merwe, an agent put in charge of kicking aliens out of their slum. The role is played brilliantly by first-time actor and Blomkamp's school friend Sharlto Copley. Copley is apparently a man with a great sense of fun and humor, and it shows in his character. Wikus is friends with everyone, he even can talk to the aliens easier than anyone else. He treats them like humans (albeit incredibly dangerous ones), which helps us sympathize with them.
I'm not particularly familiar with South African history and apartheid and all that, but District 9 is clearly a statement about that and it's obvious even to this outsider. The aliens appeared in the city nearly 30 years ago, unable to get home, and were put into a massive slum where the population and violence escalates, just as it would if they were human. The way Blomkamp portrays the aliens' situation does make one feel bad for them, especially knowing places like that exist around the world and are occupied by humans.
To me, a lover of the works of Orson Scott Card, District 9 was like a Speaker for the Dead/Halo mash-up set in present-day South Africa. I invoke Speaker because the relationship between the humans and aliens in D9 is much the same as the Buggers or Piggies and humans in Speaker. Are they "ramen", able to communicate and coexist? The humans and non-humans in both works speak, or at least understand, each others' languages. And humans in D9 can't use the alien weaponry. Or are they "varelse", unable to coexist and therefore war is inevitable? This is left up to interpretation in Card's book and Blomkamp's film, but in both cases I'd like to think it was the former.
But enough philosophy, let's talk action. If anyone was highly anticipating a Halo movie (and I can't say I was), then District 9 will be upsetting. Because it would have been real good. The drama in the film is perfectly balanced, and the documentary-style shooting mixed seamlessly and without distraction with the more conventionally-shot parts. The action was tense and exciting, at one point my palms were sweating, which hasn't happened in ages, because I haven't cared this much about what happens to the characters in a long time. I find that to be utterly essential, and the best judge to how good a movie is. WETA's effects were some of the best I have ever seen. I said this out loud in the theater, thanking any of the crew who might have been within earshot. The original plan was to use puppets and costumes for the aliens, but they decided against it and went full CG, though in some close-ups you could hardly tell. Especially in the day and outside oddly enough, the aliens are truly believable. Their ship, too, looks excellent silhouetted against the Jo'Berg skyline.
Overall District 9 was an entertaining action flick with some deeper thinking, easily the best of it's kind of the summer. So far it's in my top 5 for 2009 and depending on one other film with "9" in the title it may stay there. And it's definitely worthy of its position.
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