A feast for the eyes and ears

Rating: 9/10 (16 September 2009)

It is 12:54am and I need to get up early tomorrow, nevertheless something must be written to account for what I have just seen. District 9, the newest film with the eye and signature of Peter Jackson, is a unique alien picture the likes of which had not been made since Ridley Scott unveiled Alien in 1979 and shook the world.
The aliens in District 9 are an incredible creation, showing immense imagination. With a cast of completely unknown actors, we are nonetheless left with a very well interpreted story. Sharlto Copley (Wikus Van De Merwe), portraying an MNU agent who we feel is undeserving of his promotions and general success career-wise due to his liaison with the daughter of a man of power among the MNU, turns out to be capable of so much more than we expected.
The structure of the film, using interviewees speaking about events and shifting from different types of cameras (one being the MNU security cameras surrounding District 9, the other the actual footage of Van De Merwe's pursuits and the other the TV angle that films the interviewees) makes it so that you never really have to suspend your disbelief completely. Since almost as soon as the movie begins we are immediately put into contact with the creatures, we have longer to get used to them.
Soundtrack, pace and acting-wise District 9 is a winner. The slum is so well shot, and the arid turf surrounding it, that South Africa becomes very real with the aliens inside it.
Something must also be said for the CGI. How these aliens, their weapons, their mothership, and the rest were made escape me, but it was a work of megatronic proportions and deserves applause.
This film gets a 9/10. Even alien cynics should watch.