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It’s not often that you leave a cinema visibly affected by a film that is complete and total fiction. Having been disturbed by the story, troubled by the characters and had images permanently etched in your mind that you won’t forget in a hurry, it’s no doubt that you not only leave affected but also slightly distressed. But then again District 9 is unlike any other alien or Sci-Fi film to have gone before it and this conceptually ingenious film is undoubtedly one of the best of 2009. 

The story begins 20 years ago when an Alien spaceship was first seen above Johannesburg, South Africa. After spending months just hovering, the government decides to come on board where they find 1 million aliens leader-less, undernourished and approaching death unless something is done. They thus set up District 9, a slum like village which will house the creatures in the centre of town. But cross-species relations haven’t been easy and the humans struggle to co-exist with the unsightly scavengers they have nick named Prawns. In a bid to ease the tension government organisation MNU (Multi-National United) get involved and offer to re-house them in a new compound 200 miles outside the city. But when one of its agents Wikus van der Merwe (Copley) contracts an alien virus that changes his DNA, the secret behind MNU’s involvement soon comes to light - making Wikus the most wanted man on the planet.

First time director Neill Blomkamp – whom being Peter Jacksons protégé is most definitely a name you will hear again soon – has used a combination of live news-feeds, CCTV images, mockumentary footage and dramatic scenes to create a world and tell a story that you implicitly believe in; convinced that the only reason you haven’t heard about the Prawns before is because it must be one of the greatest media cover-ups of all time. It also works as a comment on any society where differences have had to co-exists and has been seen by many as an allegory for the South African apartheid and the shanty towns of Soweto.

The films reality is the key to its brilliance and South-African born Blomkamp has crafted a movie that not only draws you in, but grabs you by the lapels and gives you a firm slap from the very beginning until the never-know-where-its-going end. For example, the savage, power hungry, Nigerian gangsters who have moved to District 9 to enter into illegal arms trading, inter-species prostitution and selling cat food at extortionate prices (Prawns love cat food) is a paradigm of the exploitation you would expect if this were to really happen. That is unless you’re Nigerian – who may just find it offensive!

The film is consistently graphic with gruesome and violent images through-out which adds to its convincing and realistic feel, but it’s not only the violence that remains imprinted on your brain. The creatures themselves (which have been Oscar-worthingly created by the same team behind the Lord of the Rings) are revolting to look at and remind you of a cross between a giant lobster and a cockroach on steroids. Further to this the image of Wikus van der Merwe towards the end of the film (I won’t be specific and spoil the surprise) is one that will take days to leave my mind.

District 9 is a disturbing, scary and fascinating film from the mind of a unique, talented and exciting young director.