Contributory comment

Rating: 9/10 (22 June 2012)

With over a thousand user reviews already in, there is just one thing I feel strongly about which I want to add, and that is this: Unless you lived in South Africa during the apartheid years you cannot - you really can't - fully appreciate what Neill Blomkamp has achieved in this film. His satirical artistry is near-perfect. The odyssey which Wikus must complete is a multi-layered reflection and examination of what it means to be human. An apartheid-era civil servant journeys to an understanding of the Other - from the inside. Whether you are black or white or crustacean, being human depends on whether or not you are a whole person on the inside - and on whether or not, and to what degree, you are capable of recognising the person on the inside of another exterior. The different characters in the movie, whichever side of the divide they are on, or whether they are caught in between, show their individual degrees of humanity.
The only reason I took a point off a full ten is that the degree of in-your-face violence, blood and guts is somewhat stomach-churning (although justified in the context). So it is a brilliant movie which has some distinctly unpleasant moments. It remains brilliant.