Directed by Neill Blomkamp
(R)
****
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An interstellar spaceship lands in South Africa.
District 9 is a “scathing social satire hidden inside a terrific action thriller,” said Betsy Sharkey in the Los Angeles Times. In this remarkable debut from South African director Neill Blomkamp, a spaceship stalls over the city of Johannesburg. While initially not a threat to the population, the crustacean-like visitors are sequestered in District 9 and gradually driven by hunger and squalor to acts of violence. A “collective object of fear and loathing,” the scaly aliens represent just about every “tyrannized population since the institution of the pogrom,” said John Anderson in The Washington Post. Blomkamp plays on our irrational fears, and not just those about life on other planets. He cleverly addresses myriad modern anxieties about racial divides, class conflict, big business, and media overload to create one heck of an “allegorical thrill ride.” District 9 is one “great mind-stretcher of a sci-fi actioner,” said Lisa Schwarzbaum in Entertainment Weekly. “Madly original, cheekily political,” and thrilling to watch, the film “proves there’s intelligent alien life in the movie universe” after all.
