District 9 (2009)

Peter Jackson produced this quasi-documentary formatted, science fiction, action bloodbath come racial metaphor. In the 1980's a large alien spacecraft becomes stranded, hovering helplessly over the city of Johannesburg. A million or so alien refugees, nicknamed by the humans “Prawns” on account of there appearance and bottom feeder ways, are re-located to a ghetto like facility called District 9. Clashes with humans and a general dis-like of the ‘Newcomers’ (reference intentional), prompts the government to employ a large Haliburton-esq military contractor to forcibly re-locate the Prawns to a new facility 200 miles away. This movie is set amidst the relocation effort, and has as its protagonist that efforts poorly chosen, not particularly capable, duffus of an Afrikaner project manager Wikus van de Merwe (Sharlto Copley). The movie starts out kind of dry, heavily documentary and back story focused, then our awkward lead character bumbles himself into potential mutation into a ‘Prawn’, his employers try to kill him, and the whole thing leaves you with a bad taste in your mouth. Fortunately a CG Prawn with an anglicized name (Christopher) manages to fill enough of the central void of ‘humanity’ in the film, and there-by galvanize the reluctant Wikus into something of a hero, so the picture works reasonably well enough in the second half. Neat idea, but better explored in the 1980's by both the afore-referenced Alien Nation and V. Grade: C+ The similarly adverstised Cloverfield was a better theater experience.