"District 9", a sci-fi indie with mainstream polish, opens with an intriguing premise. An alien ship (big, round, imposing) hovers lifelessly over Johannesburg, South Africa. The newscaster in the film is winkingly incredulous, "not over New York, not over Los Angeles, but here in Johannesburg". The inventive, largely improvised, script continues by having the alien ship just sit there. No hostile advances, no ultimatum, no giant displays of pyrotechnics. Finally, after several months of stalemate, the military intervenes, sending helicopters up to the alien ship to cut open a doorway. What they find is also unexpected.
All this is prologue; in the film's timeline, it happened twenty years ago. As it turns out, the alien craft did indeed contain aliens - about a million of them, in fact. But (again, playing with expectations) they're not malevolent - they're helpless, nearly starved. Apparently, the commanders of the ship are all gone (it's never explained) and these "workers" have no means to support themselves. So, putting the human in "humanitarian", we Earthlings establish the titular encampment and give the aliens (who speak in a kind of guttural clicking) names like "Christopher Johnson". Naturally, with no options for its inhabitants, District 9 quickly becomes a slum. And the filmmakers make it a very realistic one. There are alien gangs, violence, rioting and extreme poverty. Or, as we humans call it, "the alien problem". Turns out, us Earth people aren't very good hosts.
Recently, science fiction movies have stopped being about anything. They're more concerned with space battles ("
Star Trek", no offense) and special effects ("
Transformers", much offense) than ideas. As TV's much-mourned "Battlestar Galactica" reminded us, the best sci-fi turns a mirror on ourselves. You have to go back to "
Children of Men" to find a science fiction film that makes you think as much as "District 9" does. South African director Neill Blomkamp, expanding his own six-minute short "Alive in Jo'burg", has crafted a film that is pure allegory (until a final protracted battle sequence). The script, co-written by Mr. Blomkamp and Terri Tatchell, isn't afraid of the questions it raises or the objections it may incur.
The film is produced by Peter Jackson, and his Seal of Approval is all over it. From the gleefully gory alien weaponry (there's a particularly nasty gun that seems to shoot lighting) to the perfectly anthropomorphic CGI-aliens (they're called "Prawns" and have wickedly expressive eyes and slug-mustaches reminiscent of Davy Jones from the "
Pirates of the Caribbean" series). The effects, as you might imagine, are stellar, particularly considering much of the film is shot in the type of hand-held "found footage" format made acceptable by "
The Blair Witch Project" and beaten into submission by "
Cloverfield". But rather than find excuses for his characters to carry video cameras, Mr. Blomkamp cleverly jumps between newscasts, security tapes and "typical" third-person filming. The result takes a little getting used to, but, even though it's a storytelling cheat, it works.
The whole story hinges on Wikus van de Merwe (fantastic newcomer Sharlto Copley), a hapless emissary sent to evict the population of District 9 and move them to a different camp 200 kilometers outside of town. The scenes of Wikus, who's like a cross between Inspector Clouseau and Borat, going door-to-door to get signatures are endlessly fascinating as we get a peek inside the slums, the alien culture and Wikus himself. Where the story takes Wikus is best left to be discovered. Suffice to say that, like much of "District 9", it isn't what you might expect.
