District 9 Blu-ray
District 9 on Blu-ray is finally here and the film that takes the movie scene by storm is a wild ride of action and adventure like you only dreamed of.
Film making 24/25
Video 23/25
Audio 23/25
Bonus Features 22/25
Total 92/100
District 9 reminds me a lot of those classic monster movies with the star of the flick getting a hideous bite from some lurking creature and agonizingly transforming into the monster. Another side of the film is the biting look at prejudice and how we deal daily with politically correct ways of dealing with things like racism and minorities.
But aren’t we talking about aliens here? Yes, District 9 deals with Johannesburg, South Africa and their alien problem. Aliens land on earth, actually they hover above it when a ship parks above the South African city and eventually humans cut into it when nothing happens.
When the government of Johannesburg and South Africa find aliens huddled in their own filth packed in like cattle they discover this is not the invasion people had feared. The aliens seem to be the worker drones of their race and know nothing of what is happening or what they are supposed to do on earth.
Much is speculated about an object that fell from the ship but cannot be found and eventually people quit worrying and tolerate the aliens as long as they stay in their district. District 9 is created to house the aliens who are not as smart as we had worried about but their weaponry found on the ship is something we are interested in but cannot use.
Only the prawns, an alien nickname due to their likeness to the little crustaceans, can operate the weapons so arms dealers are interested in District 9. Most of the rest of the world is not and the aliens end up being South Africa’s problem and eventually District 9 becomes a slum world inhabited by aliens and gangs.
Johannesburg decides to relocate the 1.8 million aliens some 200 miles away from the city to quell the public’s outcry for the slum that District 9 has become. Enter Wikus Van De Merwe played by Sharlto Copley who is promoted in his company to deal with the situation and forced relocation.
The company carrying out the relocation is supposed to legally inform the aliens of the relocation and get them to sign or at least hit the form and then they can go about the forced move. While Wikus is helping other workers and troops go about the form signing he stumbles upon two of the aliens creating some kind of liquid from alien weapons.
When Wikus opens a container and sprays some of the liquid in his face things start to occur that you would expect from an alien container. Wikus begins to transform into something else and when the company he works for sees this they try to capture him and harvest his DNA.
They attempt to cut him up and get as much DNA before he transforms completely but escapes and with the help of the alien that started all this. Wikus ends up seeing the plight of the aliens in the labs as they are experimenting on them as well as wanting to only use them for their weapons capabilities.
While transforming Wikus finds the alien he calls Christopher and they set out to get the liquid back from the lab and use it to escape the planet to get help for the million plus aliens stuck on Earth. Wikus helps Christopher to escape in the huge alien ship while he battles with the overbearing soldier who is attempting to capture Wikus or kill him.
The film is great and shows not only racial prejudices but the usual government conspiracies that theories are based on as well as the usual action and adventure in the face of overwhelming odds. Even though Wikus is transformed totally into an alien he is promised to be transformed back by Christopher when he returns in three years.
The film starts off as a documentary type with shots of Wikus going about his new job in filmed clips and how they are going about the relocation but it eventually goes to a regular action film. Action it does have with plenty of fighting and great scenes even with a mechanical suit that Wikis dons to fight his way out of the gang area and fight the company trying to harvest his body and eventually just killing him.
The film has that great pace from beginning to end and really does a great job of presenting the common plot of good guy who has no choice in his plight and does the right thing in the end. District 9 is ripe for a sequel and that will probably be coming in three years just like the plot says with Christopher’s return.
The movie may be from relative newcomer writer director Neill Blomkamp but with Peter Jackson at the helm of producing he could not go wrong. The film is great and is a definite must have purchase for the Blu-ray edition for any action/science fiction film library.
The video is great with a well done documentary feel for about the first quarter and the action could not be done better with the tell tale Peter Jackson production quality. The films video is well done with no problems I could see and exceptional color and darks with some great scenes in the slum created areas of special note.
Creating the slums and filming them with the computer generated imagery was difficult and worked out extremely well for a completely well done film. The special effects and computer generated parts are seamlessly added to the real pieces to create a world both believable and despised.
The shots of the documentary type films are sometimes of lesser quality but the whole action and “real” footage is high quality with almost no problems and certainly none worth mentioning. The audio is also up to the great Blu-ray standard that makes for a fully entertaining movie with DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 surround sound.
The film contains the surround sound track but has a great feel with plenty of really good use of side and rear speakers for a full audio experience. The action is highlighted by full use of surround with some of the shootouts being of note when you hear men and gunfire coming from off screen and then the camera pans to see that action.
Other notable audio additions include the subtle sounds of the slums like wind whipping garbage around and aliens moving about nearby but not seeing them in camera. The film has a great surround sound track and again very little even worth mentioning of things not completely up to the best standards of film and Blu-ray.
The extras on the Blu-ray edition make for a fully complete entertainment package with plenty of audio commentary and filmmakers logs as well as several making of features and deleted scenes. The extras make for a couple of hours of bonus content and exactly what you want and expect on Blu-ray to complete and fill out your enjoyment of a great movie.
The making of features are great and really show how they went about spending so much on a film with so few unknown actors and really only one large presence in the film industry. The film does have a lot going for it and will bring out some kind of awards at the next few presentations for movies best even if it doesn’t win the top trophies.
District 9 is a must own film and a definite monster movie for the new generation with its great political and racial tensions that highlight our differences even while showing us how alike we really are. District 9 is a must have film and the Blu-ray edition is the best you can get for your money in home entertainment.