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Movie Review: District 9


CobraKevin

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Summary: It's been 20 years since the alien craft made its presence known hovering over the South African city of Johannesburg. During this time frame, the aliens have been brought down to the surface and have been provided a large area of property with shack-like low-cost housing called District 9 for their staggering numbers of 1.5+ million residents. The aliens were basically given free reign to move about as they pleased, though businesses and local agencies preferred to segregate them from society wherever possible. A local group of Nigerian outlaws have been bartering with the aliens, known as Prawns, trading food for weapons. When the riots began, an arms-dealing research agency known as MNU (Multi-National United) was brought on board with the task of herding the alien populus into the new, highly secure District 10 to fully separate them from humans, while confiscating any alien weaponry found in the process. During this transition the head of the operation, Wikus van der Merwe, comes in contact with a strange liquid that begins to have adverse effects on his body. Now wanted for research purposes, Wikus is on the run fighting to stay alive in the midst of the Prawns, the Nigerians, and MNU.

 

Pros: In terms of realism, quite possibly the greatest special effects to grace a theatre screen. The attention to detail will rarely, if ever, have you questioning what you see. The movie's take on aliens being able to coexist with humans on a widescale and for an extended period of time is a rather new concept, and the documentary-style flavor plays well into the film.

 

Cons: The summary I wrote above wasn't at all what I was expecting to see based on the trailer, and I can't really say I was pleasantly surprised. I was expecting either a large-scale, alien invasion/war or some greater form of fear/terror rather than one man's fight for survival. And I'm not sure if seeing the film at 9:00 PM had anything to do with it, but I was yawning consistently by the last half hour, despite some deaths and explosions.

 

Conclusion: 3.5/5.0. Possibly affected by expectations, the trailer (particularly the teaser trailer) hinted at a film of epic proportions and I don't feel it delivered. However, it was a very solid film, maintaining the attention of the audience with special effects, subtitles, and a strange but intriguing plotline. I would refrain from seeing a late showing, though.

 

-Kevin

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The trailer had little to do with the actual storyline.

 

Effects were great.

 

The movie kept your attention the entire way.

 

Hollywood REALLY needs to quit with the shaky camera bullshit. Now. And fuck that blair witch cunt for starting it.

 

I'm a big fan, great movie overall.

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Strange, I thought it was exactly like what the trailer made it out to be... I thought it was a kick ass movie.

 

Did the trailer even show the main character at all? I know for a fact the trailer didn't lead us to believe it was a survival story essitinally of one individual.

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Did the trailer even show the main character at all? I know for a fact the trailer didn't lead us to believe it was a survival story essitinally of one individual.

 

The teaser didn't, the full-length trailer did. But even seeing the guy, there was no inclination of him being the main character of any sort.

 

Check both out here:

 

http://movies.yahoo.com/movie/1809961221/trailer

 

-Kevin

 

Edit: For those who have seen the film, there are like 2-3 quick flashes in the full-length trailer that hint at that guy being involved a lot more, but those that have yet to see it would have no idea.

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CGI was Awesome. G.I JOE should have taken a page from them.

 

enough action to keep you entertained, people blowing up was very very cool.

 

I give it a 3/5 which means it was worth the ticket price, but definatly not buying it on dvd.

1 point off for crappy shakey cameras, 1 point off for shitty ending IMO.

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Cons: The summary I wrote above wasn't at all what I was expecting to see based on the trailer, and I can't really say I was pleasantly surprised. I was expecting either a large-scale, alien invasion/war or some greater form of fear/terror rather than one man's fight for survival.

I was excited about this flick and watched every trailer, and nver got an indication that it would be anything other than what it was....?

Perhaps it's an ingrained expectation in the American mind that an alien movie will either involve large-scale intelligent creatures doing badassed activities, or less than a dozen terrifying killers. This was more real, starving people in a slum that have had to relinquish their tech superiority just to get a meal.

I liked the film, I'll own it. I'd say it was one of the first original ideas to come out of the Sci-Fi industry in a while.... but it's just a different take on a 20 year old concept:

Alien Nation

It was the 80's, so that was a detective flick. This is the 00's, so it's an anti-hero societal commentary.

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I was excited about this flick and watched every trailer, and nver got an indication that it would be anything other than what it was....?

Perhaps it's an ingrained expectation in the American mind that an alien movie will either involve large-scale intelligent creatures doing badassed activities, or less than a dozen terrifying killers. This was more real, starving people in a slum that have had to relinquish their tech superiority just to get a meal.

I liked the film, I'll own it. I'd say it was one of the first original ideas to come out of the Sci-Fi industry in a while.... but it's just a different take on a 20 year old concept:

Alien Nation

It was the 80's, so that was a detective flick. This is the 00's, so it's an anti-hero societal commentary.

 

Considering I have never, until this thread, heard of the film "Alien Nation" and there was no mention in any trailer "Based on the previous film (or novel) Alien Nation", all I can REALLY say is the trailer didn't really tell us a damn thing. So, some creepy things are living amongst humans in the slums of Africa. There's a big ship floating in midair...for some reason. And the government is involved...somehow. Some dude maces himself with....something.

 

There's actually no mention of the rebel African army whatsoever in the trailer, the sign "No Humans Allowed" sounds (to me anyways) more threatening (as in "Don't enter or we, the aliens, will kill you") than just an area of containment, and it really doesn't give you much of the plot...at all. I mean, I get the element of mystery if that was their goal, but I find it hard to believe anyone could've watched the trailer, saw the movie, and thought "Man, that was JUST like the fucking trailer made it out to be".

 

oh

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SPOILER ALERT!!! SPOILER ALERT!!!

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The scene that, based on the teaser trailer, was virtually the backbone of the film - government agent (guess) says to alien, "How do your weapons work?", to which the alien responds, "We just want to go home" - wasn't even in the fucking movie! Am I the only one that gets pissed at shit like that? Put a great scene, a funny remark, or in this case base the entire hype around a scene, and cut it from the picture. Grrrr...

 

So, I'm glad you made the connection that the trailer attempted to portray. There are a number of people who didn't, though.

 

-Kevin

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1 point off for crappy shakey cameras, 1 point off for shitty ending IMO.

 

Do you suffer from some rare vision-dehabilitating seizure disease that the slightest shift of the camera causes brain implosion?; the camera was perfectly fine, in fact, I felt that they didn't look "live" or documentary-like enough.

 

"Shitty" ending? I can't imagine any other way to end it; the movie is obviously the first of several movies and the ending is key to connect the first and second.

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